So, it's been a hard few years for everyone in the UK, but watching how hard my partner has worked to turn our lives into something better over the past five years has given me hope.

A few years ago, my partner was assaulted by a group of men who mistook him for an acquaintance of theirs and left him severely battered, broken and bruised both physically and emotionally. His recovery from this ordeal sadly lead to his loosing his job of many years, and spiralling into a low of depression and anxiety.

Fast forward to now, he has returned to college to complete a level 2 in Land and Habitat management, resumed full time work and passed his driving test (which had at one point been believed to be out of reach) only last week. He has dragged himself through therapy and counselling in an effort to improve his mental health, not only in regards to this incident but a number of things from his childhood years.

However, increasing price of rental accommodation in the UK, the cost of living, travel expenses and the like seem to be creeping ever higher while our incomes remain the same. I work full time, I study 5 out of 7 evenings and have taken a second job in order to try and find some extra cash to save up for some kind of future... One that perhaps is still living to make ends meet, but a future in which making ends meet at all IS possible.

So, we want to start up a small, private gardening business in hopes of making some extra money or, who knows, maybe turning it into something we can both build a stable life from... But he needs tools and equipment along with so many other things and at this rate, it will be many years before we can do it.

So I'm going to see if I can raise even a little bit of cash as a starting point that I can surprise him with come his birthday in late December, and if I can't make the full £500 to cover things such as a chainsaw, hedge trimmer, leaf blower etc, at least we are a little closer to the dream.