Victoria Park looked golden today with the bright sunshine and beautiful autumn coloured leaves on the trees. We're entering a period now in the Park involving general maintenance, and today we were pulling up all the flowers that bloomed through Spring & Summer. Re-planting those that wouldn't mind a bit of frost, and leaving the rest for the Park Keepers to collect and recycle. We ended the session with refreshments and biscuits, sitting in the sunshine and making the most of it before the wind and rain come back again tomorrow.

An early morning visit to the garden in order to avoid the usual crowds on the garden bench almost worked.... We had two local residents watching us work and chatting away!

We did a bit of weeding and pruning but the plants have grown a lot with the recent warm conditions so we will have to go back and do a bit more soon! We popped our prunings by an old bit of board to upgrade it from a 3* to a 4* bug hotel.

We filled two black bags with rubbish - mostly cans, McDonalds wrappers and bits of general litter. We also transferred a carrier bag full of glass bottles over to the bottle banks. Treasures that we found in the depths of the garden included a pair of Nike Trainers (we left them on the bench as they were pretty decent!), a hat, a pair of Star Wars pillow cases, pyjamas, a wrench, a sunglasses case and a handheld games console case. Enough to fill a Generation Game conveyor belt (minus the cuddly toy). There was also a discarded book of Dharma meditations which Dave read to us to motivate our Sunday morning clear up!

We will be back to do more, keep an eye on the listings for the next one

Bravo brave GGers, battling with high winds, inside-out bags and bored or bemused pet dogs!

We each chose a beach or river to litter-pick during September, getting out in the fresh air to join the Marine Conservation Society's campaign to clean Britain's coasts and inland waters.

Well done for taking a moment from your month to make a small difference that adds up to a big impact.

"In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun. You find the fun, and - SNAP - the job's a game!"

Only way to handle a Tipner beach clean!

Three of us enjoyed the late summer sunshine and stretched our legs while working at home! Vanessa made friends with lots of spiders while searching for litter in the bushes! One big bag of litter collected!

.... to my litter-picker!

It was a very high tide at Tipner this morning, but that's a bonus on a beach clean - less beach! It meant Lisa, Andy and I could make a visible difference and remove the obvious pieces of coloured plastic and the nylon fishing line.

Lisa dragged the dumped gaming chair to the nearest bin, so that hopefully it'll get collected.

45 minutes later, two sacks of litter collected, and then on with our Sunday plans.