Katelyn’s dream garden coming to fruition

She said her garden was a place where she sought solace.

“It is really important to me to be able to grow things as it gives me purpose,” Ms Downie said.

“With the one-year anniversary of my Dad’s death last Friday, I am helping fulfil his dream to do up the property and have a nice garden.”

Paul Threlfall from Reliability Australia helped organise all the different vendors to come down and assist.

Mr Threlfall sent out a letter, written by Ms Downie, calling for help with her garden.

The community heard those calls with Jack Reid, Dustin Spence, John Feldman, Belinda Currie and Val Currie from Whipstick Gardens working to upgrade the garden.

The fabulous five confirmed they would work on the garden every Thursday until it is completed.

Businesses have thrown their support behind the garden project.

Rock Solid is providing the materials required for the upgrade, Ky Hire supplied the bobcat for the heavy duty work and Bunnings has chipped in with gift vouchers.

Ms Downie said the garden would be a “safe place” for her and allow her to grow crops for her family to eat.

“It’s going to be wonderful to get out there in sunshine and gardening,” she said.

“It is such a calming hobby, you give something and it gives back.

“But it has been a learning process, a lot of reading, learning from mistakes and failures.”

When Ms Downie first moved to the house in Wyuna five years ago she initially struggled to grow a tomato.

But her skills have developed so rapidly that last Christmas she harvested potatoes and raspberries for the family dinner.

“I’d love to get to a stage where I can continually harvest food and go out to the local food swaps to grow connections with other growers which I don’t have at the moment,” she said.

“At the moment the season is for winter crops, so I plan to grow cauliflowers (and) broccoli ... I am growing potatoes out of a cardboard box.”

Ms Downie said the support from everyone behind this project had been massive and comes after a series of setbacks.

“To have the community reaching out to do this for me has been really humbling, it has restored my faith in people,” she said.

Ms Downie thanked everyone who assisted.

Rock Solid customer service manager James Hitchins said it was a no-brainer to help contribute to the garden when he heard about Ms Downie’s struggles.

“As soon as we read that letter, we knew we had to be a part of it,” Mr Hitchins said.

“Coming from someone who knows first-hand how much a garden can do for people.

“I straight away went to the owners at Rock Solid, (saying) we have to do this and Rebecca, the owner, said ‘100 per cent, do whatever you need to do to help her’.”