Easiest to prep in the fall. Do you want a raised bed so you can plant earlier or do you want to direct sow? Any chemicals thrown out under the shed? Are you going to trellis the cucumbers?

Do you have a good turning fork or garden fork. They are the easiest for me to work with.

Soil - Do you have access to horse manure (needs to hit 130F for three straight days to get rid of harmful bacteria), rabbit manure ready right from the get go, leaves - we have lots I run the lawn mower over them to mulch them up, breaks down easier. I have learned of a 40 horse barn that I'm accessing here in the South. I let the manure cook, add fall leaves and this year will be adding straw from my small area of straw bale garden. If you have no compost yet, straw bale gardening is a quick way to get lots of it by summers end. Worse thing about the horse manure - my dog thinks it's her personal playground and took livestock fencing out to get to it:)

Do you want to put some type of row covering over it so you can get earlier veggies? PVC or electrical conduit works fine. Have you started composting?