I have a fairly large lawn in Northern California as well. We enjoy it thoroughly. The kids and I play on it daily and camp on it as well. My water bill was about $170 last month but that was the peak. Most of the year it's under $100 and in the winter months it's about $20 per month (I did not irrigate for 4 months last winter). Not all of California is an overpopulated desert using imported water.

On the other hand, having a lawn at other times in my life did seem to just need to be mowed all the time and still looked bad.