Last year I stalled early on as I struggled with first finding the time and then the gumption necessary to construct my greenhouse. To cap it all I spent too long deliberating over the layout and materials of the vegetable garden settling for a half-hearted attempt to cover the grass with bark and some shoddy square beds. The grass grew through the chippings all too quickly and the beds, whilst functional were never loved – looking as if they were dropped on the ground and not grown out from it.

I’ve started to dig in manure and rake over to remove the larger stones but the vegetable bed isn’t the only area that calls for attention. I have to make a start on the culling of the Spanish Bluebell horde before they riot through the the garden. Then there is the pond and it’s unloved, rose and fern bank surround, the tired and worn grass square, another L-shaped bed empty save for clay and weeds and finally I’d like to cut the grass verge near the roadside to neat, clipped edge. And for that I’m going to invest in a new tool – An edging spade.