What do draught and sausages have in common? It is not the draught beer and wurst at Oktoberfest, oh no! It's a bit too early for that and a bit too far West. Tonight a GoodGym trio, Sevan, Kash and Klaudia, who came to her first session 🥳, set off on a journey to East from Ealing Broadway. Despite totalling a decent distance (8 km on the way there and back), they haven't made it to Germany but stopped in Acton to meet Mary, Yvonne and Lone from Ealing Repair Cafe, a trio who fights waste by teaching people to repair and upcycle clothes by using patching or darning techniques. What a bunch of legends!

Yet another trio, Claire, Emmanuella and Kate (AKA the Punctual Ones), were already at the task location, The Doughnut Factory, accompanying the Ealing Repair Cafe team in creating useful stuff from old stuff using stuffing techniques. They were cutting and sewing old jeans legs, then filling them with scraps and damaged blankets to make draught excluders for the clients of Ealing Soup Kitchen. Those oversized sausage-shaped objects of varying sizes and densities could be placed at the bottom of draughty doors or windows to keep the cold away in the upcoming winter months. The idea was to use upcycling to provide a low-cost option for vulnerable people to make their homes cosy without spending too much on heating! 🧣

Partway through the task, one more trio arrived, who had to use a series of secret knocks to get inside the headquarters of The Secret Sausagety (Sevan gave me a look when I wanted to use The Secret Sausagety as the report title, which I resisted doing, but I couldn't resist using that pun!). Chris, Lena and Marta joined the fun, learning how to use a sewing machine, practising their hand-sewing techniques, and playing tug-of-war in an attempt to stuff three rolled blankets into a single jeans leg. It was intense!

As a result of an exceptionally long (time flies when you are having fun!) over 90-minute Tuesday evening session, ten draught excluders have been created, and - oh boy, is it finally complete? - the upcycled GoodGym flag has been finished! A shoutout to Claire, who has hand-sewn the last two pieces - the GoodGym logo elements - to the flag fabric. Claire became the GoodGym Ealing legend forever in the crafts department! 🏆

Well done to the entire team for their thirst to learn new skills and use them for good while reducing the waste of damaged clothes, and special kudos to Klaudia for sticking out till the end at her first session, then running back to EB with the group 🙌

A massive thank you to all three members of Ealing Repair Cafe for their fantastic workshop idea and for teaching GoodGymers sewing. 🙏 Fingers crossed that the clients of Ealing Soup Kitchen will like the draught excluders and keep warm during the winter.

If you loved the Ealing Repair Cafe workshop, you may be interested in the following:

• Help Mary promote the reduce-reuse-recycle mindset by joining next week's GoodGym task in Acton - sign up here!
• Check out what other events Ealing Repair Cafe has planned
• Check out the brand new Ealing Library of Things, where you can borrow useful equipment without buying it - what about a sewing machine for your new project?

The Brentford Festival, which the GoodGymers helped set up had ended on Sunday, but the festival gazebos that had partied very hard were now a bit lost in the aftermath. They were the last ones to leave the field by Blondin Park Community Pavillion and now had no idea how to get home. After two days of gazebos not returning to their container, the event manager, Linda, decided it was time for a GoodGym intervention.

Seven GoodGymers (and one GoodGymer-to-be?) ran, walked or cycled to Blondin Park to give the gazebos some comfort and gently pack them away into a cosy storage. Steph gave each gazebo a warm hug to prepare them for spending the upcoming months in the dark sleeping bags, just unfolded by Sevan. Before the tents could make it to the container, Claire and Lena moved festival tables inside first and stacked them neatly.

It was Lena's very first session and she already showed unparalleled enthusiasm for doing good while problem-solving and having fun. Welcome to GoodGym Lena!

With the tables sorted out, the whole team moved on to unfolding and folding back the six-legged gazebos (the monsters-size Gazebos which you should write with a capital G!) to adjust their frames and shake any water off the roofs. The latter looked like an attempt at a mini-storm simulation, with the canvas fluttering dramatically and raindrops sprinkling the faces of GoodGymers caught in a torrential downpour. Was it a prelude to the wet winter tasks outdoors? Hopefully not!

Martin and Gus specialised in compressing the Gazebos and squeezing them into the giant gym bags. One of those covers had a broken zip, and despite Gus' heroic attempts to make it work, the ultimate solution was to use the old-school bungee cord. Steph got caught up in Lena's ritual of wrapping the gazebo bag with the rope and almost ended up as an annual sacrifice to GoodGym gods. Luckily, with his running mastery, he managed to escape last minute!

Five gazebos, dressed in covers or not, made it safely to the container, where they were left to sleep and recover from the festival. It was then that Linda found a couple of rogue gazebo limbs outside! The GoodGymers couldn't tell which of the gazebos might have misplaced parts of their frame, so the spare legs were placed together with the rest of the festival tents to await their next big outing.

Speaking of outings, that Tuesday was a special night for GoodGym Ealing with a pub quiz as a reward for another fantastic month of doing good!

Next Tuesday we are visiting the Impact Theatre again to do prep for painting - sign up here!

If you cannot wait for a group task with us until next week, pop to Horsenden Farm for a task and social lunch with The Horsenden Loaf pizza!