Tonight saw us return to Global Gardens, you can tell the weather is better when we start the community growing spaces again. 5 goodgymers, and a Ben made their way up, Michael and Neda walked from the meeting point, met halfway by a running Nathan. Llion met us at the task, eager to get started, and Su and Ben made their way from a little closer and walked up....apparently seeing a tornado as they went.

Look out Toto

Michael let the group into the allotments only to find a concerned Su pointing to bellows of smoke in the distance, so we quickly got everyone set up before running to see what was happening.

• Su, Ben and Llion were given the watering duty - is there's a veg bed then water it!
• Nathan and Neda were taken up to the sensory space, where the hazel saplings needed help to breather and grow. Time to cut those brambles back.

Whilst everyone got to work, a concerned Michael ran over to the second set of allotments, where his very own plot was. Unfortunately, one of the holders had been burning some waste (naughty) and it had gotten out of hand and caught on the trees.

After a brief chat with some fellow plot holders, and witnessing the arrival of Police, and fire engines, Michael quickly made their way back to the group with an update.

Joining in with the team, Michael got onto some strimming duty, tidying up the entrance to the sensory garden - but not going over board, it is "No Mow May" after all.

A longer Tuesday than usual, but that was to be expected with all of the commotion.

We will be returning to Global Gardens in two weeks, May 20th to celebrate as goodgym Cardiff turns 8. Get signed up now --> here

Our community mission Friday, returning to Cwtch Together to finish off their garden just in time for the 80th celebration garden party.

Neda was on weed duty, clearing the pathways and spraying the gates to give them that just finished look.

Martin took to the hover mower, if only it was like the hover board in back to the future. Still he took on the entire lawn, determined to finish.

And finally Michael, on strimming duty, first with the portable, tackling the worst overgrown areas first. Then after the battery ran down, it was time for the regular strimmer, helping Martin finish.

I just an hour, 3 goodgymers made a huge difference to the space.

See you Tuesday for our group task.

Yes..... There is something about Imy, she has wings.....

congratulations on your 100th deed

Of course the celebration called for the finding of the old fairy wings, which Imy wore with 'pride'

We made our way to our task tonight, painting the never ending railings. Perfect weather for painting though, and a new beautiful jogging route along the river, much better than the Winter option.

We did a bit of extra time tonight, doing 40 minutes volunteering, whilst chatting about the upcoming birthday celebrations of goodgym, Llion and the Welsh language songs from our resident Eisteddfod favourites, Imy and Andrew.

Join us next month as we celebrate community gardens and on the 20th May we have our 8thbirthday

Get your wings...

A shout out to all that came today, they were in dire need of volunteers this week. Michael spotted this early and gave a shout out on the WhatsApp group, and then again on a night out at the Musical Rave.

Our 6 volunteers helped to get to the number allowing the event to go ahead.

A great turn out for the event with a whopping 169 runners on the course. 23 first timers and 41 new PBs.

A coffee and a chat afterwards before heading away for another week.

Join us Tuesday for some rail painting... Get signed up here

With what looked like a potential rainy Tuesday again, we were worried that we may not achieve our goal this week......

2 TASK TUESDAY

Michael, our resident weather man kept a watchful eye on the Met Office App and assured everyone that the rain would not be coming in until 20:00...

We met at our usual place and split into our two groups of runners and walkers, everyone was meeting at Cwtch Together tonight to begin with. The runners were the first to arrive, just in time to meet with Flo who had made their own way to the task to donate their old dolls for use at the charity play group.

That deserves an extra deed

Michael said Helo to Jon, who was meeting us tonight in place of our usual Sarah. We quickly got the tools out to help with the garden. Michael meandered around the grounds, before briefing Flo who was taking ownership of the task tonight at Cwtch. There were some brambles starting to come through, as well as some 'Lords & Ladies' (Arum maculatum) popping up so the strimmer was needed to remove these, especially the 'Lords & Ladies' before it goes to seed in Autumn and spreads anymore.

Once the walking group arrived, we split into two groups for the second task. We bid farewell to Emma, Emma, Flo and Neda who were going to take on the Cwtch task.

Heading over to the Grange Medical Practice were, Michael, Aimee, Emily and Llion. We were greeted by Chris from Grow Cardiff, we had been here just 2 weeks earlier (read all about that here). Tonight's call was to get the soil delivery into the raised beds...

Shovels at the ready

Straight to work, we were digging soil from a bag straight into the beds on one side, whilst emptying another into wheelbarrows on the opposite side. Some strange conversations as Michael suddenly burst into song with a rendition of the theme tune to Poddington Peas..'Why' I hear you ask.... we still don't know.

This was a great workout with some heavy lifting added in once the bags were empty enough to lift straight into the raised beds. A great day this week with two tasks completed (3 with Flo's donations), thanks to all for joining in.

Join us next week for some fence painting fun, sign up here

Due to circumstances out of our control our task for the evening had to cancel, and so we moved to the ever reliable litter pick. The weather was very changeable, and we had a yellow warning for rain and wind......quite a night for exercise.

We split into two groups, our walkers stayed in the City Centre and helped to clean it up, they even saw a duck or two. Who knew we had ducks in the City Centre....

The second group, the runners, made their way up to the alleys on Whitchurch road for a good clean. It was a nice run, followed by a walking litter pick, some interesting graffiti and items were seen. Unfortunately as we stopped for our group photo the rain started up again.

We ended extremely wet, but don't let that put you off coming back!