On our very last group run of 2019, 27 GG Yorkies came along for an absolute beasting at St Nicks.

With Maria leading the task, we were privileged to have Jonathan join us for a run tonight for the second time in GG history.

On arrival, we learned that there was really quite a lot to do, so we split into two groups with the 'easier' group sawing conifer trunks into bitesize pieces whilst the 'hardcore' group prepared a new nursery bed by digging it out, lining it with weed-guard and creating a border with extremely heavy sleepers.

For the first time ever, we had the use of a saw horse, which was very exciting, but only for two people at a time. Ed and Nick bagged it whilst everyone else was sawing over benches and other logs.

This is what chainsaws are for! John

Leanne had picked a particularly girthy y-shaped log and was determined to saw it vertically. She'd even lined it up very carefully with the slats of a picnic table.

Carl, John and Katie were in charge of bringing wheelbarrows full of long conifer logs to the sawing team and retreving the newly-sawed pieces to go back to storage. Apparently the cut pieces with be "seasoned" for firewood, hoping its a hearty blend of cayenne pepper and smoked paprika but we shall wait and see.

Jonathan thought two people could lift a sleeper, but Aiden nearly lost his arms, so they tried four instead. The other team dropped their sleeper after 200 yards. After some serious recovery time they very sensibly decided to get all seven on one sleeper, apart from Jonathan who bravely held the light.

Even with 8 of us, that's the heaviest thing I've ever lifted! Paul Kelly

Next up, the team took 2 wheelbarrows and 4 spades into the deep depths of the woods to the site Jonathan had earmarked for soil excavation. This may or may not be the burial site of the previous team, who were this elusive team?

Where we're going you don't need roads.

At this point it became clear Jonathan is clearly a robot. Realising time was against us, he decided to run with the wheelbarrow full of soil to the site of the sleepers. Debs and Craig walked, hoping they may one day regain feeling in their arms.

Whilst the nursery bed team were very busy completing their task and over-running a little bit (not even Legendary Leanne and her mighty headtorch could find them) so the rest of us packed the saws away and warmed up our cold hands with an outdoor-adapted version of the 12 Days of Christmas workout!!

The adapted version involved slightly slippery lunges, a very simple and easy version of a burpee which everyone definitely enjoyed, lots of high fives, a variety of press-up techniques and the strangest sit-ups you've ever seen.

The nursery team all made it back to finish the workout with us and then Craig got to finally wear the Centurion Cape for the run back, after he completed his 100th good deed weeks ago!

We must also give a huge salute to Craig's (very heavily pregnant) wife, who was slaving away at home making delicious biscoff brownies whilst we were out doing good, they did not last long in the pub...

So, officially, notwithstanding a couple of community missions, that's a wrap for 2019. What an outstanding year it has been and a huge thanks to every single one of you who's been a part of it. You've made a massive impact in the community in York and I can't wait to celebrste with you all at our end of year party on Friday!

36 GG Yorkies came to improve the wildflower meadow at Millennium Fields.

Tonight we all gave massive high fives to Laura, our very own taskforce legend who only joined GoodGym in April and has already completed an amazing 50 good deeds. If you haven't cheered her yet, make sure you do!

Laura also back-marked for us, swishing her cape as we ran along the river to Millennium Fields. Jonathan was in the far corner of the meadow sending morse code signals with his torch.

The task had three parts, all to do with connecting one end of the meadow to the other, and making the edge of the woodland a wildflower haven.

1. Digging an inch of turf up in a large patch, ready to plant seeds
2. Scarifying another large patch ready for seeding
3. Planting wildflowers along the border of the woodland

Digging is popular in winter so the 9 spades got snapped up super fast, followed by the rakes. Everybody else grabbed a trowel and started planting the wildflowers.

Is this definitely a plant?

I think I've just planted some mud

Some of the wildflowers did look a bit like Jonathan had filled a small plant pot with soil and some leaves, but he assured us there were teeny tiny roots in there with perennial plants that would flower next year.

People were planting one plant and then switching with a digger or a raker but the plants were planted so quickly that Jonathan had to come up with a new task which was basically digging a whole new patch, read for seeding... but using the trowels.

Just pretend your trowel is a spade - Jonathan

Then there was another bonus task which was digging up some tansy plants from down by the river bank to plant in our newly dug out area.

Whilst all this was happening, a few people were tool-less so we did a short pilot of the fitness session, and once all the tansy was planted, the whole group gathered for an extremely complex game of stuck in the mud (with plenty of real life mud).

This version involved rescuers who can only hop, baddies who can only lunge and people who are stuck having to squat continuously until they're rescued.

I can't squat anymore, someone save me!

After everyone eventually became stuck in the mud, we made our way back along the other side of the river, with an optional 1km time trial. Kudos to everyone who boshed it, and especially to Debs who managed to run a new mile PB!

Laura made a lot of really delicious apple cake to celebrate her 50th good deed, thanks Laura!

Til next week.

On this crisp autumnal afternoon a group of eager GG Yorkies made their way to the Groves to meet the team from Flower Power York to finish off a task we started a few weeks earlier.

We were informed we had an impressive 1500 bulbs to plant (rather than the few hundred advertised... Sorry guys!!) and were given very detailed instructions on what needed to be planted where... "We want it to look random... But not TOO random"

We had a variety of bulbs including tulips, daffodils and grape hyacinth to fill up the pre dug borders and areas around the bases of two trees. With the instructions fresh in our minds and trowels in our hands the team, including newcomer Sam, cracked on with the planting!

After about 20 minutes Mitch asked a very good question.... "Do bulbs need to be planted a certain way up?"

Yes... Yes Mitch, they do!! It will be interesting to see how his patches turn out come Spring!!

Most of the planting was done in record time and we were informed that we had 300 bulbs left to plant in 15 minutes! This was followed by the rather bizarre spectacle of a gaggle of trowel wielding goodgymers following team Flower Power along the borders as they scattered bulbs and told us to bury them where they landed... It was an odd but somewhat effective strategy with only a few slight snags (mostly the accidental digging up bulbs we had just planted)

All bulbs were safe in their new soily homes in under an hour and it was time for a group photo before heading off with another task completed!