On a lovely warm summer evening as the sun settled down in the sky this band of Goodgymers made their way by biking running and walking to the Riverside Meadow beside New Bedford Road. Welcoming Chrisshane and Omayemi to their first Group Run. 👋🏻

Our mission for this evening was a familiar one, uproot all the Goldenrod. We've met this plant before which is invasive and trying to take over on this meadow, but it's back to test us again. It is noticeably thinner than in previous years, a good sign that we are winning, and there was a good mixture of native plants in the gaps we have cleared.

So we got stuck in and started pulling at the clumps. We made good progress and managed to clear about half of the field before our time was up. We'll be back soon to finish the job!

Hosting at the Community Jobs Fairs has become a regular occurrence for GoodGym and it was good to have team of experienced job fairs hosts, joined by Emmanuel for his first one. The tasks involved welcoming clients and supporting them with the registration process. Emmanuel soon got the hang of the electronic registrations and along with Abdo, Omar and Gill, they were able to sit and support people filling in the online form. Ali kept us on our toes, making sure we had the correct form on the iPads and also keeping a record of the number of people coming in. It was a good opportunity to network with some of the employers as well as to make the visitors feel welcome and at ease. Gill also took the opportunity to liaise with groups such as You Turn Futures, who may wish to sign post some of the people they support to join GoodGym who would like to do some active volunteering. Once again Matt and Shannon were really appreciative of our support, and now know that, as old hands, they can rely on us to be the hosts with the most.

There was a Tex-Mex vibe to the meal at FoodCycle today and we had 5 GoodGymers helping to make it success. Gill arrived very early as she was Project Leader in the kitchen and got the church unlocked, and prepared the kitchen for the cooking team before turning her attention to the dessert - home made churros and a warm chocolate sauce. Lucie arrived and was soon making magic with a like of potatoes, turning them into delicious spicy wedges to accompany fajitas while Neill and Bauryzan started setting up the hall, laying the tables and getting everything ready for the guests. Martin joined the kitchen team and created 5 trays of cheesy nachos for the starter. It was good to be able to provide a themed menu and we had lots of happy guests. Neill and Bauryzan did a great job hosting and clearing up after. Another fabulous team effort.

Darshini and I weren't quite sure what to expect of today's mission, but it certainly gave us plenty to occupy our Sunday afternoon. We were expecting to be trimming shrubs, but when we got to the property, Mr Z explained that he would like us to cut back all the ivy from the fence at the side and possibly dig up some roots. When we looked at the roots to be removed, they were deep tree roots which would have taken a mini digger, rather than two goodgymers with a decidedly dodgy looking garden fork. So we left them where they were and concentrated on the fence. And yes, the ivy was pretty offensive, and cutting back the first layer let loose a whole load of dust fro decaying leaves and goodness know what. Fortunately Mr Z's mother offered us masks... unfortunately she didn't offer them until we were about 3/4 of the way through the task. We worked well as a team - and while I concentrated on cutting back the ivy Darshini concentrated on scooping it all up into a bucket and transferring it to the front of the house. It took a good number of buckets - no wheel barrow available - but at least we got our step count up. Then there was rubbish to be put in a skip, a pile of debris to be moved and another big shrub to be cut back. There's still some more to be done, so hopefully we'll get a couple of other GoodGymers out in the next week or so to finish what we started.

Ms N was so pleased to see me as her hubby is just out of hospital and they were wanting to be able to use the garden, which was a tad overgrown. After clearing some brambles I got started on mowing the first half of the garden, but the back half had much longer grass which needed strimming first before mowing. There were a lot of brambles left at the back of the garden with lots of blackberries, and Ms N was so chuffed when I offered to pick a bowlful for her . Hoping to go back to complete the task next week.

6 Luton Goodgymers joined Friends of Leagrave Park, Kev from ABCD-IN-LUTON and Spiderman on the monthly community litterpick.
As ever lots of interesting finds around the park, bags of tiles, cans, take away food, a drum kit, a scooter and the almost obligatory shopping trolley 🛒. In total whelmed to collect around 30 bags of rubbish 🗑 . Great effort by all involved. Well done 👏 ✔️ 👍🏻 👌 😀