I have been raking leaves from the lawn for weeks now and still they keep falling. But there is something beautiful about them – extending even to the general autumnal decay of the garden at this time of year.

It’s been a damp day – more like gloomy November than crisp October – but it did outline some wonderful floating webs on the box.

Somehow the nerines are doing well this autumn. The petals are a bit tatty, and the pink ones have to peer through the apples to find light . . . but they’re looking good. It’s only taken a few years!

How to sum up the garden in three words? Verdant, scented, bountiful? Overgrown, haphazard, defensive? Both combinations are accurate. The new Harlow Carr rose in its planter looks and smells lovely. Tiger lilies, jasmine and honeysuckle perfume the evening air. I can’t keep up with harvesting gooseberries, raspberries and blackberries. (I’m almost glad the wood pigeons got the unnetted redcurrants last month.) I’m eating new potatoes and mangetout peas. The purple clematis is finally in its pomp, and the astrantias have come up white this year. We have been (ahem) “fortunate” enough to have had plenty of rain, so everything looks happy.

But . . .

Keeping on top of pests is never-ending: soft fruit is netted against magpies, wood pigeons (boo hiss) and blackbirds, and I’ve tried to make vegetable beds into cat minefields. Plus some more cat scarers. Parts of the garden need a flame-thrower or machete: yesterday I hoed a patch of ground elder at the base of the hedge, and I daren’t go down to the bottom of the garden for fear of finding more to do.

It’s looking OK. The vegetables are generally thriving (but tree roots spread everywhere, taking advantage of the nutrients I add in the raised beds), the dead patch on the grass is slowly growing over, the blackberry plants are monstrous – oh, the usual mixture of “how lovely” and “sigh”.

I just hope the new climbing rose will forgive me for inadvertently imprisoning it behind an enormous teazle.

Oh, how I wish it would rain again! Everywhere is so dry and I have had to refill all four water butts from the hosepipe. It’s lovely to have fine weather of course – but a few nights of rain would be perfect.

As ever, things are a bit hit and miss. Parts of the lawn are lush (the advantage of cutting high) and parts are dreadful (the disadvantage of killing moss). The hostas are looking good . . . but wait until the slugs find them. The jasmine – so profuse last year – has not recovered (yet) from its brutal trim. Edibles are covered in fleece, chicken wire or tin foil scarers. The colourful spring burst has faded and I’m waiting for a second flush; meanwhile the peonies flop and the forget-me-nots run to seed. I’ve finally planted the Harlow Carr rose in the planter and now realise that everything else there would be better for being moved; the bare-rooted climbing rose (Bring Me Sunshine), planted a while ago, is imprisoned in an obelisk and will have to fight its way past the teazle and acer which have, unsurprisingly, put on growth more quickly than it has. I’m determined to keep the clematises in good order this year so go round regularly weaving in their tendrils, like tucking hair behind one’s ears. In good news, my fears that the new blueberry – without a companion this year – hadn’t been pollinated were unfounded.

The garden is racing ahead and I’m trying to keep up. It’s its usual haphazard self – full of self-seeded colour around my not-so-bright ideas. (For example: I moved the camellia into a new pot two winters ago without considering that, yes, that spot does get the morning sun in April – and now all the blooms are the colour and texture of the paper bags that apples used to come in.) Potatoes, peas, radishes and salads are pushing through, and I must do something about the moss in the lawn.

Oh . . . and I succumbed to my rose urge. Twice.