Monday night is GoodGym night

It was great to see the team tonight ! Thank you to you all that turned out to the task.Apart from anything else we had a really nice chat and catch up.

4 weeks ago we were at The Heene Community Garden laying cardboard under the soil to try and prevent the weeds growing. We went back today to ensure the cardboard is doing its work - and , it really is! Apart from some bindweed and few tiny weed shoots across the freshly dug soil we seem to be winning the battle. However if we had left it another 4 weeks it may have been another story! Tonight we weeded and cleared filling 2 bags! We will continue to win the battle 😇😊

Many thanks to Paul, RoxyElRickyMel and Paul for your time and energy today..

Next week,with the clocks springing forward,meaning light evenings again, we are returning to St Botolph's Church which is a GG Worthing favourite. I hope to see lots of you there!

Have a great week!

Julia xx

On a stunning evening on the extremely sunny south coast 10 of us gathered at Heene Community Rooms garden on our mission to finish laying cardboard under the freshly dug soil.

Congratulations to Mel on her first half marathon at Brighton at the weekend - the first of many I think! Also well done to Paul who pulled a great time out of the bag despite having been ill.

Megan and Stéphane headed out for some interval sprints down to the seafront and back. They were worked on a perceived exertion scale gradually increasing the effort over 5 repetitions of the same distance. Suffice to say I think they had a great work out!

Ricky worked on removing tape from the cardboard that I had acquired whilst the rest of the team worked on digging up the soil and digging it in.

Shout out to our very own ultra runner Roxy who despite all her recent kilometres, put some energetic digging. Many thanks to you all for some serious effort with this task - I actually feel we may have finally cracked it !

El came up with this great pun after I had mentioned to John that it was fine to take a break from his energetic raking !

During the task eagle eyed Belinda spotted our very own Worthing fonder member Beth running by with her brother and Dad. I hackled her enough that she couldn't ignore it so she stopped for a brief chat and photo :) What a lovely surprise!

Many thanks to Paul for completing his task force training - maybe a task report may be a first chance to flex your TF muscles?!

Looking forward to seeing lots of you next week - I'm not quite sure what the task will be but watch this space !

300 good deeds done

What a night to celebrate our wonderful Barbara milestone. Our very own Babs has been doing good since May 2017 . She not only attends the group sessions but also volunteers at Wadars, our local animal shelter, at least once a week. Congratulations and Thank you ! We cant imagine GoodGym life without you :)

Cardboard City

The community rooms have been a long term project for a few years now. Every time we go back its overgrown again so this year we have come up with another plan. Tonight John and Belinda kindly recycled their recent electric bike purchase packaging to lay below the freshly dug earth. However firstly it needed to be dug!

Whilst the star of the evening headed out to get some steps in with Belinda and Daisy , who it was lovely to see again ( Happy New Year :) ) the rest of the team set to work.

Paul got stuck in the end of the garden that we had barely touched before. He was joined by Paula and then also Belinda, on her return. Our ultra runner Roxy did some amazing energetic digging perfectly preparing the ground for a generous layer of cardboard to be laid. Barbara joined in with Roxy on her return from walking.

It was so nice to Gillybean back on a Monday night. Special mention goes to Gill who has been busy volunteering at the food bank Tuesdays and sometimes Wednesdays too. Shout out to any of you who may be free on a Wednesday as the food bank could do with regular extra volunteers please.

Sarah and John worked and chatted as they always do - take a look at one of the photos of them together - I reckon we could have a caption contest :) John was in charge of the cardboard arranging and beavered away whilst some of us stood and admired his handiwork !

At the end of the task and to mark the special day, the team formed an arch with their tools for Barbara to run through - we managed to capture it with a video and photo too. Some then said their farewells whilst the rest of us headed to the pub for part 2 of our celebrations.

Barbara generously bought us all a round of drinks before we presented her with a beautiful engraved glass gift that she can drink her vegan hot chocolate in. What a lovely evening it was. Makes me feel very proud to know you all.

Here's to the next celebration - Will it be Sarah's 100th ?!

Have a good week.

Julia xxx

301 good deeds

It was good to be back with the gang tonight and especially to be with our very own John, who was celebrating his outstanding 301 good deeds . John's GG journey started during the January 2018 challenge. Literally from the sofa to the tasks John has completely embraced the groups activities. You may or may not be aware that he also gives me a lot of support behind the scenes for which I truly appreciate 🙏

John was very relieved to see Megan back after her first task with us last week when he was in charge of the team ! Luckily Megan appeared happy to be back and together with Stéphane set off for some fitness running interval drills. El joined them for the warm up rep which was ideal for her for this evening. Megan and Steffe did some escalating interval training. Same distance each time but with increased effort using the perceived exertion scale.

Meanwhile the rest of the team were ready for the big dig ! We have been visiting this community garden for a while and its been an up hill battle to keep on top of the weeds. With a great number of participants this evening and plenty of forks everyone was able to work together and get a real grip on the task. I couldn't help but notice that Paul had a very impressive fork , Roxy , Anne and Ricky andEl all dug in hard clearing around 75% of the garden. We will return!

After their fitness session. Megan and Steffe helped tie up the bags and transfer them to my car. John and I then drove to the seafront bins where the refuse team will ( hopefully ) pick them up.

Finishing up, we headed to The Brew House for a cheeky drink. We presented John with an engraved tankard to mark this special occasion. We also celebrated that Megan was wearing her new red GG teeshirt! Nice one Megan - same time next week?!

Looking forward to seeing you all next week :)

Julia xx

It was great to welcome back El and Stéphane for their second task with us. We really enjoy having you both along and hope to see more of you in the future 😀

A big thank you to Barbara for welcoming everyone and leading the fitness session tonight. Sarah El and Stephane set off on a run whilst Paul , John Barbara and Sue cracked on with the task .... and what a task it was !

We had been asked to dig over the garden of the church rooms where we have often volunteered in the past but this time the condition of it was the worst its been - it was all so overgrown and quite daunting to know where to start!

However with the help of big garden forks and lots of team energy together with determination we made significant progress. We dug and cleared the bond of weeds that covered the whole area.

Paul , Stephane and Sarah " volunteered " to take the blue bags down to the seafront to the bin collection point. Nice work you three 👏 💪💪💪 - remind we you are off the hook for this job next time !!

We are returning next week to the same task to give some more time and strength to it. If you are coming please bring a garden fork if you have one !

Have a great week and hope to see all of you again soon.

Julia xx p.s The group picture I took didn't come out but thank you to Sue for the great ones that she took 🙏

Fading light

We arrived at St Botolph's on what had been a very gloomy day, meaning the light was fading fast. It was our last visit of the year to this pretty church garden under the watchful eyes of Rik and Val. However we will be aiming to get some work done at Heene Church rooms over the winter months,

Roxy and Suegot stuck straight into sweeping leaves with Belinda getting her steps in, wheelbarrowing big piles of leaves to and from the compost heap.

Paula and John worked on digging over the doomsday font that we had spectacularly unearthed several years ago before planting up some palms and other shrub that Val had provided. John, Roxy and I also moved a huge stone from the font area around the corner to where the other large stones/ rocks reside - Roxy stepped into help after I got distracted after completing 50% of the task !

Sue from Heene Cemetery did some great sweeping whilst Rik and Val, our leaders, beavered away weeing and clearing moss from gutters.

Happy Birthday to me!

Roxy had very kindly made me a yummy chocolate cake birthday which was still warm so we shared it out and I took home the remainder-such a kind thought. Thank you Roxy!

Next Monday

We are at Heene cemetery for our final visit of the year - Ideally we would like to start at 5:30 pm to catch the light.