New lawn & red clay

I'm hoping to get some advice from DGers who know anything about establishing lawns. Pics included are all from our back yard. Basically it's clay & we've tried planting grass 2-3 times already. We got the soil sample, added the lime & a little gypsum. We've got some green sprouts here & there but obviously not a lawn yet. Our temps here are in the upper 90's for the next week or so (prob. for rest of spring/summer). We've started trying to water to keep the clay moist. Other than putting down more gypsum what else can be done? I've ordered a small amount of the water absorbing crystals (3lbs.) from the co-op to see if that may help. Thanks.

trying to get a pic here w/ the color green in it. lol. We retilled & planted more seed 3-4 weeks ago. Is it time to just leave it be till fall? (please say no)

It is late to start a lawn. The roots grow when the temperatures are cool at night. September is ideal.
Amend the soil with organic material but do not seed.Then spend time reading up on starting a lawn from seed while you are sitting in the shade with a cool drink this summer. Talk to your county agricultural agent for advice. Come early Fall, you will be ready and conditions will be right, both soil and temperature for good growth. You will still need to "baby" the seed with frequent watering, etc., but all the ducks will be lined up for success.

Did you till the soil and put hay on top of the seed? I can't see any hay.

Smokey

Without the straw it could be that the birds are eating all your grass seed and that's why nothing's growing. I agree with gcshari that this is not the best time of year to be trying to start a lawn though, but when you do try again I'd definitely cover with straw. And adding some additional organic amendments is a good idea as well. I'm also not sure you did as much as you could have in terms of soil prep, it looks like there are some unlevel areas where water might collect and cause drainage issues, plus an unlevel surface can make it harder to mow. It looks like you've got a slight slope in some places which is fine, but the surface needs to be smoothed out so you don't have peaks and valleys everywhere. Here are a couple links that talk about prepping for a new lawn, some of them may be for sod instead of seed but a lot of the prep work is the same (also note that some of these sites are from other areas of the country, so check where they're located before following specific recommendations on grass types or proper time to seed)
http://www.turfgrasssod.org/trc/soilprep.html
http://www.suite101.com/lesson.cfm/19442/3030/2
http://www.thegardenhelper.com/lawncare.html

I've given up hopes of a lush green lawn this year, so I've stopped watering. Just a waste. Hopefully I can get the soil ready like you said, gcshari. I've never had to do this on such a large scale (1 1/2 to 2 acres), quite frankly it's overwhelming, but no need to be wasteful anymore.
Smokey, you are dead on, it should be covered in straw once we get that far again. Truth be told, to get our CO(certificate of occupancy), we strew straw on pretty much the same type of situation you saw in those pics, about this time, last year. My goodness, what an itchy, nasty job that was, horse flies biting the dickens outta ya, inhaling nothing but dirt & dust. I'm guessing that's why we didn't do it this time.
What I'm trying to get going is some composting & soil amendments. The links you provided, ecrane, are indeed useful, thanks. Jury is still out on the peaks & valleys though. As you can imagine the major stumbling block is money. We don't have the funds for getting an experienced operator in here to work it so it'll be a bit more level. I look forward to any thoughts, suggestions or empathy, you might share. lol

If you're handy with things, you can always rent equipment and do some grading, tilling, etc yourself. The trouble is if you don't prep the area right before you do the lawn, you'll end up having problems down the road and have to keep redoing some/all of it, it's better to spend a little more money up front and do it right.