Ed and I arrived at Mrs K's pristine garden wondering what on earth there could be to do.

She - very sensibly - has AstroTurf and gravel to keep it low maintenance and she grows all her flowers and plants in pots.

Our task was to empty out all the end of season flowering plants from their pots, leaving as much soil as possible.. and to leave the perennials.

Now, Ed and I know, theoretically, what a perennial is but neither of us were clever enough to actually identify one. We solved the problem with Ed holding up various pots to the kitchen window whilst Mrs K leant on her zimmerframe and gave us thumbs up or thumbs down.

We filled the green bin, sneaked in a tiny bit of weeding in the gravel and headed off for a community mission afterwards. Lovely.