Rick - you would have a wonderful conversation with the pedologist in our department - trying to speed up the soil forming process with your manual labor.
I live on an alluvial fan so I am grateful for the flooding and the sedimentation. I don't have to worry about being needed - there are always copious amounts of weeds that "need" to be moved.
I did dig up almost all of my front lawn, one shovelful at a time. And I did spend many hours shaking the soil from the grass so that I can reclaim as much of the soil as possible. Especially since there were so many earthworms in that layer. I was able to fill up the area behind the retaining wall with clods of lawn that I overlay with compost (Ifinished and unfinished since I did not have enough of the finished stuff but wanted to plant some veggies in there this year) and the reclaimed soil.. I was determined not to have to buy soil - so in that way, we are alike.
vegetable bed in July one month after planting
I have an informal compost bin in the back that I will continue to fill with plant material and use them in the fall to continue to raise up the bed.
