Our garden is taking shape. To the untrained eye, it’s about 50 square metres of chalky, flint-filled, unpromising soil, with the recent addition of a bizarre collection of variously sized wooden rectangles on legs. But to the novice vegetable-grower who models this aspect of her lifestyle on Barbara Good, this is progress. No longer does the garden merely contain an excuse for a lawn and a compost bin. It has Raised Beds.

The transformation came on Monday with the arrival of my Dad and his Black & Decker workmate. Fuelled only by a ham sandwich and a few cups of coffee, 12 pressure-treated planks were transformed into seven raised beds – a fair return on my investment by anyone’s standards. (Thanks, Dad.) Although we’d previously dug up the lawn and removed a space-munching hibiscus bush, it was only with the arrival of the raised beds that our little garden started to look like my carefully measured plan, and to fulfil my hopes of growing a proper range of vegetables, rather than just the odd wigwam of runner beans and tiny plot of potatoes.

This weekend will see further strides towards completion of The Plan, as the raised beds are stacked, the soil re-raked, and the stones and junk removed. (There’s plenty of junk – 1980s soft drink cans are a speciality – as our road was built in 1986 on the site of a transport café and its car park.) Once it’s de-stoned and level, we can install the beds and fill them with compost, and the planting can begin.