GoodGym was just a tad excited that Kingston Round Table's carol wagon was back with Santa after being forced off the road by Covid last year. This annual tradition has been going for well over 50 years and we heard stories of how Kingston adult residents who grew up in the area remember it from their childhood.

Our night was for Spear - a brilliant local charity that helps the homeless get back to living independently in the boroughs of Kingston as well as Richmond, Merton and Wandsworth.

With a 2 hour medley of everyone's favourite carols being broadcast from Santa's sleigh down the river roads of North Kingston, a fabulous troop of us & Santa hit the roads at pace to ring on every door bell in the area with our collecting tins...

Let them jingle, jingle pounds for Spear... or let it snow, let it snow, with pounds for Spear.

And it did! The awesome team of Martel, Jane and Simon from GoodGym, the fabulous fundraising team from Spear of Heidi and Bruce, other staff and volunteers from Spear and Round Table we estimate we jingled to the tune of over £500!

GoodGym would also like to say congrats to Heidi for doing so much in her time for Spear and wish her well in her new challenge at Hestia.

Photo credits: Heidi and Martel.

Oh my dear, Oh mighty Spear 5 rounds we fear! We had no idea

So between Jane, Will and Adam and poster boy Andy from Spear we finally did the final round & delivered all Spear's leaflets round Kingston residents!

(Rain & holidays took us alot longer than normal)

The 3 of us delivered all the leaflets we had but need another load to complete all roads.

What a fantastic fundraising night of comedy for Spear on Saturday night - the local homeless charity in Richmond, Merton and Wandsworth to get homeless people back to independent living.

And what a novel refreshing change for our GoodGym runners! It was most definitely not your typical mission...

A stellar line up of comedians provided first class entertainment to raise funds - Ed Night, Kerry Godliman and President Obonjo no less.

Backed up by a dream team from GoodGym groups all over London who ran the bar and the pizza kitchen which was busy all night long raising more funds for Spear! Carol from GG Lambeth and Rob from GG Barnet ran the bar like a landlord and landlady. Martel, Jess and Kate from GG Kingston and GG Richmond ran the pizza kitchen like trained chefs. And John from GG Camden, Jane and Simon were an eclectic mix of floor managers setting up the stage and theatre, security, and waiters and waitresses taking pizzas to guests in their seats!

All topped off by hearing some great comedy.

It was an awesome GG team and thank you SO much to those who crossed London to do it. I hope you all got home safely and weren't too shattered for the rest of your weekends.

The venue for this community mission was a grand one indeed! This Saturday 3 goodgymmers were very lucky to see inside the grounds of Trumpeter’s House in Richmond, owned by Baroness Van Dedem and home to some stunning gardens. Spear, a local charity who help the homeless to find accommodation and gain independence, were holding an Art fair and garden party fundraiser and Goodgym were very pleased to help.

Caroline and I kicked off, assisting with the morning set up. After being warmly greeted by Joy and Heidi from Spear, we were put to work setting up the marquees (a task we do best!) and moving the boxes of books to the correct stall.

Next followed another arm workout in the form of filling and carrying tea urns and lugging various crates of drink down the cellar stairs. This also turned out to be a great workout for the brain too, as we used our Tetris and spacial awareness skills to fit as much as we could into the freezer. Caroline turned out to be scarily skilled at this, squeezing boxes in left, right and centre in spaces that definitely looked too tight as I looked on with awe!

We then moved on to some balloon blowing and creative string tying to decorate the entrances and stalls. Caroline still had plenty of lung power left after her run, creating an impressive pile of balloons in no time, whilst I tried my best to stop them escaping all over the lawn and tie them into a decorative bunch.

In the afternoon, more help came in the form of Jane. This shift included manning the garden entrance to the party on Richmond riverside. GoodGym weren’t supposed to be on break down duties but in true goodgym spirit, Jane stayed on to lend a hand as Spear had so much packing up to do. Next year we need an army of GGers for that part!

4 runners were “rocking around the Christmas tree(lined)” streets of North Kingston this evening to help raise money for SPEAR.

They had done a leaflet drop the day before to let everyone know that “Santa Claus is coming to town”. The winter evenings are certainly “the most wonderful time of the year” to find generous people at home keen to donate to worthy causes.

“It was beginning to look a lot like Christmas” as we joined “Santa’s Super Sleigh” led by “Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer” to knock door to door to wish “Merry Christmas Everyone”. It was certainly not a “Silent Night” as we walked the streets with Christmas songs blaring from the Santa Sleigh Stereo!

It was a really fun evening that helped us all to “Step into Christmas” and we agreed that we had all had “a very Merry Christmas” mission!

Feedback from SPEAR: Thank you so much for the tremendous SPEAR support at Kingston Carol Wagon on Thursday! We all had to move faster once you'd gone - you certainly covered some ground!

We usually don't hear until well after Christmas how much is raised at this event but I'll let you know as soon as we know.

It was certainly SPEAR's healthiest year in terms of volunteer numbers and, for this, we thank you.

Have a wonderful Christmas one and all.

Best of all possible wishes, Joy