Actually, I only cut about a third of it, but plan to do the rest tomorrow. I love our new Canadian Tire reel mower with much love. It took me less than 30 minutes to put it together out of the box, is light enough for me to lift easily, pushes very smoothly, and has 9 height-of-cutting settings. I managed to skin my knuckle badly on one of the blades taking it out of the box, but it’s a second-cousin to a scythe, so I guess it needed to be blooded.
Anyway, it only took me 45 minutes to do two full passes on 1/3 of our half-acre of lawn, so I’m very optimistic about its ability to keep the grass cut all next summer. I’ll try to do the rest of the lawn tomorrow, because it’s supposed to start raining on Friday (Boo! Friday is Market Day in Maxville and I wanted to cycle!)
out here 
Are you planning on keeping a 1/2 acre of lawn? Or is that destined to become garden and/or native plants? The omnipresence of large lawns which require watering and mowing has always seemed so strange to me. I have no idea why new suburbs aren’t being planted with something else more appropriate for our climate.
We’ll be keeping some of the lawn, probably just enough for our visiting friends’ kids to run around (and chase our yet-to-be-acquired dog), and for people to lounge on when we have barbecues. A good part of it will dissapear to: fruit bushes and other perenial food plants such as asparagus and rhubarb, one or more herb beds, flowers (wild and not), and free-range chicken habitat. Much of the lawn is native grasses and clover, and only lawn-like species that can survive without watering will stay.
The previous owner had 2 of those ride-on lawn tractors. We’ve got a push-mower…