Thursday 6:15/ 6:30pm is GoodGym Windsor Night! 👑🏃‍♂️🏃🏻‍♀️

Tonights community mission was at Spital Cemetery clearing weeds and collecting litter. A first for the Thursday evening session.

Bekah ran to The Binoy for 6:15pm to say “hi” to Jen who was walking and then she ran on to the task to meet the others.

We eventually 🤣 gathered at 6:30pm and the task owner Karen and the local cat showed us the area we we needed to tackle. Got on the classic fm for some calming background tunes.

Our fab GoodGym Team tonight was Gareth (welcome to his first Thursday evening session), Jen, Sue, Mandy , Bekah and Didem.

Gareth and Didem set about doing a quick litter pick on their way to the main area of work.

The weeds had over taken the rose garden of remembrance and with traces of ashes visible we had to be mindful not to disturb these. The weeds had blanketed the whole of the bed and some of the roots were really deep. The thistles had also grown very densely Bekah tried to tackle these but they were a bit to prickly. Hopefully after all our hard week the rose will have some space to thrive and any future scatterings will be much nicer.

Jen volunteered herself for condensing the green waste and then Didem and Jen took the bag down for collection.

After the task we opted for a calming quick yoga session perfect for a cemetery. Not that we were much calmer afterwards as it was just too funny 🤣 Jens classic line “I don’t think I’ve ever done yoga in a graveyard before “🤣

At the end we did the Windsor curtsy and bow 👑 and said our goodbyes.

Thank you all for coming ♥️ and Namaste (nah-mah-stay)

Sue, Margaret, Gareth and Sheila met at Spital Cemetery for one of the regular work parties on a beautiful morning. Maggie joined a couple of other volunteers to help clear the bindweed, creeping buttercup and plantain which were trying to take over the rose bed in the garden of remembrance. Meanwhile Sue and Sheila tackled a massive rose root which had infiltrated a grave over many years, and Gareth took on some mature leylandii branches overshadowing another grave. Conditions were difficult, especially for Gareth working in a confined space, but some dogged determination showed some definite progress. The next workparty will include a Goodgym Windsor community mission on the evening of Thursday 25th July. Sign up here

Sheila, Juli and Gareth gathered at beautiful Spital Cemetery for their regular clean-up session, a mild sunny day. It was great to meet Gareth, returning to GoodGym after a bit of a break. There we were met by Cllr Karen Davies, who organised the session, together with a couple of other volunteers. Karen gave us an introduction to the site and some quick HSE watch-outs. Gareth took on the task of litter-picking around the site, particularly around the chapel which seems to be a regular haunt of the Windsor youth. Sheila and Juli started tackling the removal of ivy from headstones. The first headstone we tackled, we quickly realised, was being held up by the ivy, so left it alone. We moved on to a grave that had been tackled by a previous work party, but needed further work to keep the ivy at bay. Once the inscription was revealed it proved to belong to Robert Howe who had been the Clerk of Works at Windsor Castle for 25 years. We also managed to remove a large amount of dead ivy from a taller monument, which was very satisfying, although we seemed to make quite a few spiders homeless in the process. But never fear, there is plenty more habitat for them to utilise! There will be more work parties soon, so watch out for listings.

GoodGym Windsor and Maidenhead is 1!

Covid-19 has given us a very different year to what we expected, but we haven't let it stop us from building a community of one-derful people, who have collectively done a whopping 723 good deeds and been motivated to stay fit and active along the way. We certainly weren't about to let Covid-19 stop us from celebrating our first birthday in style!

We had a Zoom quiz and natter, with lots of good sportsmanship and big laughs. Highlights from the evening included:

• Being able to give Jen (VIP guest from Slough!) and Sara a big round of applause for their 100th and 50th good deeds respectively - amazing achievements from these superstars! Also learning about what they have been doing with crisp packets at Terracycle near Slough.
• Lots of us being able to put faces to names and say a proper hello having only 'met' before on WhatsApp or read about each other in run reports.
  
• Tara joining straight from a shift at the Maidenhead Covid-19 vaccination clinic - way to go Tara!
• Big excitement at the news that Parkrun is expected to return from the 5th of June and Junior Parkrun (for 4-10 year olds initially) from the 11th of April. Hurrah! We were particularly honoured to have Parkrun Director Nick B joining our celebration as a VIP guest on the historic day of this announcement.
• A big up to Sani, Rich, Jen, Jess, Sophie, Wendy, and Fran, who were all there at our launch and are still part of the family one year on.
• Matt's demonstration of the running man.
• Everyone doing the twist.
• Attempts at jumping jacks without leaving the sofa.
• Seeing what it would look like if Queen Elizabeth II dressed up as Paul in a Santa hat and went out for a run.
• Seeing what it would look like if Sophie and Elton John had a child and he grew up, joined GoodGym and helped rescue baby toads.
• Nick S's reaction to finding out that Timmy Mallet lives nearby.
• Amy learning how to use breakout rooms (thanks to technical support James)
• Laura, Gareth and Tara of the 'Cool Chefs' being super focussed and nailing every challenge in record time.
• Team 'We are Pants'' innovative choice of team uniform, in particular Sophie's styling of her hair through the leg holes.
• Fran's stamina when it came to keeping her pants on. It did not go un-noticed that Nick S whipped his off at the earliest opportunity.
• Jen's explanation that she was a 'Llama in pyjamas' disguised as a bear. Obvs.
• Claire from the 'Mad Hatters' wearing a child's riding helmet.
• All the celebratory drinks.
• Brilliant efforts to GoodGym-ify the lyrics of Queen's 'Don't stop me now' such as: >(Don't stop us now) We're digging such a big hole We're planting a tree (Wear fancy dress) Goodgym always has a good time So give them a call!
• Re-writes of Bruce Springsteen's 'Born to Run' to make them more relevant to the present day, such as: > Oh covid, trapped like us Bojo, let us out to run Come with me, athletes like us Baby, we’re born to park run
• Adaptations of Bonnie Tyler's 'I need a hero' with Boris in Johnson in mind, such as: >I need a haircut, I’m holding out for a haircut till the end of the spring. It’s got to be short, and it’s got to be blond cos I want be the next king.
• And a second verse: >I need a vaccine I'm holding out for a vaccine by the end of the year It's got to be safe and it's gotta work And it's gotta get me out for a beer
• The group singing/rapping these lyrics in unison.
• The fact that I recorded it so I can watch it back whenever I want to. Bwa ha ha ha...
• Our agreement that next year's celebration will include going out together for a pizza and lots of hugs.

Happy birthday to us!

An extra well done to everyone who also went for a celebratory birthday run, and special mention to Amanda, who brought birthday balloons (and a big smile to lots of people's faces) for her run with Amy around Maidenhead's Parkrun route.