The rainy morning didn’t scare off the amazing runners today for the 2 task summer planting party!

A lovely bunch of keen-to-do-good runners met at Oxford House at 2pm (unsure of what the weather was to do and what the contingency plan may be!) with quite a task ahead of them. In preparation for OH!’s Cafe launch on Monday the task consisted of cleaning the windows, weeding the “Pocket Park”, litter picking and sweeping up the ramp and surrounding area to spruce it all up and make it look gorgeous for opening. We got our gloves on and quickly got stuck in, time flew by with great work done and brilliant conversations had and many a weeds removed! We got a lovely thank you from the task owner Deborah and a few snaps, before we said our goodbyes, and a couple of peelers had to leave.

Next was a quick fitness session with a run up the road to Parkview to help with some more garden work, all set up and explained to us wonderfully by Connie, a couple of runners met us on our way and some more met us at the briefing. We were shown the 2 different tasks and told what to do in each area before splitting into 2 groups, collecting our gloves and tools and heading to our areas. One group cleared some Japanese knot weed from a garden wonderfully, and were done in no time so came over to join the other group and help out with their task of completely clearing a very weedy area (apart from one “purple-leaved bush”) in order to turn the soil and plant some lavender out as well as a black current bush. The group was thankful for all the recent rain as it meant there was no need for us to soak the ground anymore and the weeds came out without too much of a struggle! The rain started coming down during this task but no one seemed to particularly mind as everyone was so stuck in with getting the task at hand done!

Time flew by again, the task was completed and it was time to head indoors to the Glasshouse Community Centre at Parkview for a session of Pilates led by Laura which was absolutely fantastic (Ab-tastic ;-)! ) everyone felt well worked and relaxed as we said our thank yous and goodbyes - and headed for the pub!

A great extra add on of a social at the local pub for a drink and some food in lieu of our picnic due to the weather was a lovely way to end a perfect day of multi-tasking and fitness!

We all had a great time and there was a great turn out, maybe you will join us next time?!