Friday night was a fantastic follow-up to our fabulous fork-filled Friday a fortnight ago.

This time there were a hardy 17 of us on a slightly chilly, breezy night. We convened, in a break from tradition, on the lawn on Old Ford Road in a nice big open space suitably keeping our distance from each other, while tremendous task owner Katherine gave a quick welcome and listed our activities for the hour or so ahead of us.

As jobs were dished out, we ended up scattered around the estate immediately getting stuck into the tasks at hand.

First to put up their hand for some weeding near the recently planted fruit trees were Jess, Srta, Kat and Sian who were so keen to get started they did so without any tools, relying on considerably brute force to pull the weeds out most successfully.

Just down the road, Team Isabecs™️ (Isabelle and Becs) were joined by Alex to weed the delightful corner bed, and as you would expect did a suitably excellent job of it.

Boris and Reika got stuck into weeding the flowerbed diagonally opposite them and what a superb job they did particularly considering their relative GoodGym inexperience - both clearly naturals!

The fab four of Rosa, Lucy, Charlotte and Sree were dispatched to the beating heart of the estate carrying out a myriad of digging and weeding tasks with the crew joining Raspberry Queen Lucy as she tackled pruning and tying back of some crucial raspberry bushes.

Hilary and Si were on Rose bush planting duty which meant digging two large holes and then planting the colourful variants of roses after Laura has expertly transported them to their new home. Their digging efforts were most appreciated given the designated spots were less than conducive to their forks and spades sliding through the soil, and but their toiling was well rewarded once the roses were in the ground 🌹🌷

That left me with the only job remaining, and having been bestowed with a trowel rake and a packet of hollyhock seeds I sought out suitable places against the wall with suitable sun exposure for them to be planted. A combination of some liberal scattering of seeds under a layer or two of soil and plenty of luck should see a smattering of hollyhock bushes climbing up the fences and further brightening the estate in no time at all.

The timed raced by the team had transformed some key areas of the estate and planted a great number of future delights to brighten the picturesque estate 🌴🌲🌳🌵

Special mentions section

A massive GoodGym welcome to Reika for her first ever task - as you didn't get the customary welcome round of applause, I hope this virtual clapping will make you feel suitably welcome and we can't wait to see you again! 👏👏👏

A big Tower Hamlets welcome (back) to Newham Hamlets duo of Rosa and Hilary. It's been great to see the recent influx of GoodGymmers in both directions across our wonderful boroughs 👫👭👬

Kat for showing up enthusiastically well ahead of the start time and despite not having her trainers but still got stuck in with delightful alacrity.

Well done to Alex for working extra-specially hard to make up for his comparatively less than punctual arrival ⏰

Laura for flitting around spreading joy and laughter throughout the estate whilst taking many superb photos (the majority of which make up the report) with thanks to Becs for her brilliant photographic contributions as well 📷

Great work to Si for his athletic endeavours managing to fit in a lap of Victoria park before the task had even begun 🏃