It’s not to say that I don’t do my share of digging – in the past year, I’ve laid a deck on my own, levelled and laid my own lawn, created raised borders and planted out 20 containers. So not lazy, then. However, when my back isn’t strained, I often find I just don’t have time to keep the garden looking good.

So, pretty happy that someone’s just sent me details of a company called The Balcony Gardener. I’ll warn you – it’s not desperately cheap, but in terms of how much time and effort you’ll save, it’s a bargain. The company plants up and delivers good-looking containers to help you create ready-made gardens. Choose from contemporary, edible and English country, among others. And, if you have got time to do it yourself, check out our plant galleries and garden design galleries, all on our gardening pages.

So what did you think? For what it’s worth, I think it’s refreshing to have anything on tv that isn’t about making money from your home. I’m not nearly fresh-faced enough to believe that the programme will do anything to change the way we think about our homes – we’ve all invested too much (financially and emotionally) in the whole housing process for us not to look at a house as an investment, even if it’s a long-term one. And with savings rates being as low as they are, many of us still think it’s best to sink hard-earned cash into property rather than put it in a bank.

That said, having done up six houses myself, it’s great to see someone approaching a renovation in a way that doesn’t involve a) trip to DIY store, b) trip to giant furniture store to buy roomset and c) trip to supermarket to buy ubiquitous products to accessorise with. I’m not knocking any of these approaches – we all go to Ikea, for example, because their furniture is cheap, just about stays together AND you can buy a whole room’s worth of furniture that looks really quite good together. The only hassle is getting it through the check out.

However, that kind of room, while stylish, swish, modern and, importantly, affordable, is never going to be unique, individual and one-off – and that’s what really makes a home interesting. And while I don’t want to put anyone out of a job at these bigger high street or retail park stores, I do think it’s high time we all supported local British craftspeople who work really hard, for little profit and almost no national recognition. And if the show does nothing else but to inspire us to think a little bit more imaginatively about how we design and decorate our homes, it will have done a good job.

What do you think?

It even kept me awake last night. Emma from the 4Homes office wondered if Kevin would describe what he wanted from the menu by using his knife, fork and napkin to build a representation of the dish to the waiter. I’m more haunted by the thought that, were I to win, I’d order my food, and Kevin would then turn to an imaginary camera and say, ‘Of course, it’s all very well Lucy ordering beef, but it’s just not very eco-friendly, is it? And, more to the point, she’s never ordered a la carte before. If you ask me, this could all go horribly wrong.’

My musings went further, of course, as they do in the middle of the night. I imagined Kevin diving for my dish with his own cutlery, so that he could see what it was like to have a go at cutting through my sirloin. ‘It’s a very satisfying process, isn’t it?’ he’d ask me as he sawed through the meat. ‘And this meat is a real beast.’ Kevin would then ask me what I thought about the merits of geo-thermal heating, while all I would manage to answer, in the presence of his greatness, would be an idiotic, ‘I don’t know but I do think MDF’s cool.’

Finally, of course, we’d have the conclusion, delivered wisely by Mr McCloud in the foreground, with me in the background, picking my teeth at the table. I’d like to think I’d have pulled the lunch off, snatched victory from the jaws of defeat, come in on budget and on time, without planning problems or arguments with neighbouring tables. It’s much more likely that, in the presence of Kevin, I’d only have managed a liquid lunch, and it would all have gone, as Kevin would say, ‘horribly, horribly wrong’. Thank God I’m not allowed to enter the competition. But you can.

How would it go for you? Let us know…

How Gay Is Your House? Quiz – Find out if your house has the camp factor
Which Grand Designs House Are You? – Because you’ve always wanted to know. (I’m the Cumbria Underground House)
Mansion Impossible – Ridiculously addictive flash game you can play while the boss isn’t watching
Swedish Furniture Name Generator – I like this. A lot. Find out what you’d be called if you were a piece of furniture from a certain Swedish retailer
London Parking Spaces – Find out how much they’re worth (too much, that’s how much)
ThisIsMoney Property Quiz – Featuring our very own Kirstie, Kevin and Sarah
Sarah Beeny’s MySingleFriend.com – Get your mate a date
Celebrity Houses – Marvel at the opulent world of celeb property
Amazing Architecture – Head over to Dezeen to see the world’s most cutting-edge new buildings

If those don’t keep you going ’til half five, you should probably just go home now…

We’ll put up something on 4Homes about this ASAP, but in the meantime you can find out more info here – www.kirstieslostring.co.uk

The intention is to bring all UK homes to a level ‘approaching cation neutral’ by 2050. Unfortunately the document fails to specify where the money’s going to come from to pay for it.

You can read the full story here, and get info on how to save energy in your home here.

Michelle Slade, analyst at Moneyfacts.co.uk, says, ‘Both borrowers and savers have been penalised following the last base rate cut and it is hard to believe that it will be any different if base rate is cut again. Many of the large high street banks passed the cuts on equally to SVRs (standard variable rates) and savers. However, Barclays Bank, through its Woolwich brand, failed to pass on any cut to its SVR, but cut its savings rates by up to 1.75 per cent.’
Forgive us if we don’t throw our hats in the air with joy just yet – we’ll wait and see how generous the banks are this time first.

What’s more, the competition at the cheaper end of the market for good looking (if not good quality) kitchens is really, really fierce. Far better, some would think, to brave the aisles and kitchen planning department of Ikea, and to bag a kitchen for just a couple of grand, than go somewhere like MFI, where the perception of the quality of the kitchens on offer was much the same as Ikea’s, and to pay over twice the price of those at the Swedish giant.

And, sadly, I think the atmosphere of the store itself didn’t help. Unlike Woolies or Ikea, which have always been packed (to the point of hysteria) when I’ve gone in there, MFI has only ever been deserted. I’d far rather choose a kitchen in a quiet, calm atmosphere like MFI’s, but who wants to buy where no one else is? It’s like passing an empty restaurant on a Saturday night in order to stand in a queue at another one up the road. The food might be just as good in the first one, but if no one else thinks it is, why should you?