☔️ 20 excellent GoodGymmers braved the risk (and reality) of rain for our group run this evening.

🦸‍♂️ We celebrated Stef’s 200th good deed with the multi-coloured cape of glory (sensibly removed for the digging part of the task).

📚 We named, numbered and warmed up while recommending good books that we’ve read recently.

🪲 We had a two-task session tonight so Ed and Nick jointly led half the group to meet Nicola from St Nick’s for some nettle-scything/tansy beetle-spotting.

Here’s what Nikki had to say:

Penny and I decided it was the best type of GoodGym task: mild peril + destruction 🙂 we had to employ the scythe and dive technique to not get nettled in the face by the giant monster nettles

And Ed added:

We got to put together the scythes then got to work on the nettles which we hacked our way through pretty quickly, so had plenty of time left to wander down to millennium fields and go tansy beetle spotting. 🪲

🚸 Meanwhile, the rest of us headed to Dringhouses Primary School, via a slightly scenic, mostly off-road, courtesy of my sketchy knowledge of York and Leanne filling in the gaps. We were met very enthusiastically by Claire who had been there all day, with a bit of help from a few staff and pupils.

🌺 Our main job was to dig over a patch of turf, add some compost and transform it into a flowerbed. As it was starting to get a bit crowded round the flowerbed, a few people started clearing and litter-picking the area behind the bike shed.

🌼 With a 5-minute warning coming just as the planting was about to start, it was all hands on deck to get as many plants (plus a tree!) as possible planted in the remaining few minutes. A hive of activity followed, with teamwork absolutely making the dreamwork. We had dig-and-plant pairings while Claire and Joanna tackled the big tree.

🚮 Meanwhile, Sherilyn found an awkward layer of plastic matting in one area, which she and Michael managed to excavate very effectively. Michael even gave back the soil that had attached itself to said matting.

👍 We were thrilled to be able to plant all the plants and leave the area looking much better than when we arrived. Very satisfying all round.

💪 Opting for the direct route back, we met the rest of the gang for some on-the-minute fitness. A few quick bursts of energy later, we were ready for home/the pub and the delicious pastries that Abigail had brought 🥐

💪 22 excellent GoodGymmers gathered for the workout of the century (until the next time) at Hull Road Park with St Nick’s. We congratulated everyone who did the York 10k yesterday, and thanked the water station heroes 💦

🎉 We also said a huge congratulations (in their absence) to Amy and Ed on their wedding on Friday (the first GG York-born wedding! In the spirit of celebrating, we named, numbered and warmed up by discussing how we enjoy celebrating special occasions. Drinks of different varieties featured fairly highly, along with food, travelling and lie ins 😴

🥳 The party pacers partied off while some of us went via St Nick’s to collect plentiful wheelbarrows (amongst other things) ⛏️

🗻 We regrouped at the park to continue tackling “the big mud mound”. We set to work swiftly and soon perfected our system to maximise efficiency, with mattockers, shovellers, barrowers, lifters and rakers all doing their thing to build up the bank for the local wildlife 🌱

🦋 Jonathan explained that this is part of a bigger project to transform this area of the park and basically make it a bit more natural and wildlife-friendly. They’re already seeing the benefits and the hope is to attract water voles to burrow into our new bank so look out for those 🦫

🦺 Max did a health and safety briefing about the risks of careless mattocking on top of the mud mound, which James and Martin definitely heeded…

👍 There was shovelling with a gusto, running with barrows and co-ordinated barrow-lifting, with Vicky impersonating a supermarket checkout tannoy at times, to ensure maximum efficiency. Abigail and Martin jumped the fence (which will hopefully be surplus and therefore removed once our bank is properly established) to rake the tipped mud onto the bank. Care had to be taken not to fall into the bog and Abigail soon learned why some of us have dedicated GoodGym given the amount of soil that ended up in her trainers 👟

🏃‍♀️🚴 Having made a huge amount of progress with the mud mound, it was soon time to head back. We replaced the fitness session with extra mud-moving and ran back to base where we stretched off.

🍳 We also discussed the parkrun-breakfast-community mission combo on Saturday (and why it’s especially important to come to at least breakfast this week given that post-parkrun Knavesmire breakfast days may be numbered 😳

🌤️ 22 excellent GoodGymmers met for this evening’s (mercifully dry and unexpectedly sunny) group run. We were thrilled to welcome Joanna for her first group run and congratulated Graham on his 50th good deed. Excellent stuff 💪

☔️ We named, numbered and warmed up whilst discussing our favoured wet weather activities. Baking, reading and games featured highly, alongside getting out and enjoying the rain in various different ways 🧩

🥳 The party (or is that picnic, or maybe sexy) pace group set off first, followed by another group that was swiftly split in half at the first set of traffic lights. Thus, the first half took the “scenic” route to get there and arrived later than the rest of us despite their objectively speedier legs 🦵

🌺 We were greeted by Gordon and some other local volunteers who were slightly wowed by the number of us. More tools were sourced and an explanation given as to our purpose there. We’re supporting the transformation of this area into a wildflower area and our main tasks this evening were to rake the “arisings” and get rid of as many pesky docks as possible in the time available ⌛️

🌱 So those with rakes raked and those with spades dug (leading to some impressively long dock roots!) being extracted! Those without tools used their hands to pull up as many weeds as possible from around the edge and also to gather the arisings piles into bags to be dragged into the undergrowth 🌳

📸 The team worked swiftly and were able to make good progress in a short amount of time. It was soon time for our group photo, before ceremoniously “throwing” our tools over the wall to be returned to their homes. A rather larger party pace group returned, some might wonder if to avoid tonight’s fitness session 🤔

🎲 Said fitness session did involve the “dice of doom”, which aren’t actually that bad (especially as some exercises were vetoed for being too floor-based). We got some good exercise in before heading back to base and on to the pub/home 🍻

📆 There are some exciting sessions coming up this week so do join if you can. Thanks for another great session everyone 😁

Fantastic 4 helped Woodthorpe York Community Group with tidying up after summer festival - main event organised by the group on an annual basis. 4 gazeebos were folded and taken to local volunteers homes, a lot of litter was picked up and 2 bulk bags full of litter dragged to the skip.

Well do e Team!

💪 27 incredible GoodGymmers met for our group run on yet another sunny Monday evening. And I don’t say incredible lightly- lots of people had come along after doing Endure 24 weekend, two of whom (David and Michal) had done Endure solo! What a bunch of heroes.

🦸‍♀️ Speaking of which, we also had two official heroes to celebrate this evening. Charlotte was doing her 50th good deed and Barbara was doing her 502nd! Amazing!

👟 Finally, lots of people had brought shoes for our collection for the Jog On charity. We reckon we had 29 pairs in total!

🕛 We named, “numbered” (which some people struggled with more than you might expect!) and warmed up whilst saying what we’d spend 24 hours doing if we had the chance (sleeping and eating were both popular, along with raving, of course Stef!)

🍎 We then split into two groups. Ed led the run to Holgate Community Orchard, with Pete backmarking. They were greeted by lots of people who’d joined by bike, and Claire who was our official photographer this evening, and gave these highlights about the session:

• Max found a number of flower pots but not enough to resuscitate Bill and Ben the flower pot men.

• Nick was prompted to toss his caber/caper but then Debs appeared with a thicker stick and a martial arts sporting event transpired.

• Turns out York GG has a number of folk who could well be management material, as was judged by the number standing round, leaning on tools chatting.

• Tarzan was spotted swinging on ivy (being pulled off the tree). Abigail skipping skills on ivy rope.

• Ivy roots were dug out by team spades.

• Others pulled up the usual weeds, rocks, carpets, metal things (including car steering wheel lock), netting etc etc. Piles of weeds were created.

• A stack of wood was enlarged.

• Rocks were relocated to hold down the weed blankets.

• Lots of Endure24 banter.

• Two capes.

📦 Meanwhile, Amy, Mitch and I were packing all the trainers into boxes to send to the Jog On charity. We filled two big boxes, with optimal shoe tessellation, which we then walked down to the Spar on Bridge Street (after Martin had done an emergency dash for more tape as mine ran out!) There was much discussion about the awkwardness of box-carrying, and then more about the fact that the Spar is no longer a Spar and is in fact now a Londis. We got them there and posted, and took our spare box to Dom’s for a further collection next week. We then cycled to join the rest of the gang at the Orchard.

📸 It was soon time to run/walk/cycle back but not before we’d had both a group photo and a bike group photo.

🍰 Back at base, it was time for stretching, cake-eating (thanks Barbara) and pub! We also discussed a few sessions that need a few more pairs of hands this week:

🌍 Tidying up at Planet Food on Thursday afternoon,

📚 Book-sorting at Tang Hall Library on Thursday evening,

🌱 Dealing with the docks at Acomb (as in plants, not ducks, doctors or dogs) on Friday evening,

🔫 Pretty Muddy Race for Life volunteering (aka marshalling, including spraying water at runners!) on Sunday.

👍There are also a few (non-gardening!) missions listed at the moment so do sign up for any that you can.