Five GoodGymers went to help at the Baby Bank this morning on a baking hot day. We started with an unusual request - to cut back the bushes in the car park so that the signs indicating the designated car parking spaces could be seen and stop any car parking wars breaking out with the other users on site. With a slightly dodgy pair of secateurs we did our best and managed to free up the signs on 4 car parking spaces. We then joined Karen and Helen doing our bread and butter activity - good old clothes sorting Kudos to those who decided to uphold the GoodGym ideals - Sheila K ran, Carol walked and Sheila A cycled to the task

There were three GoodGymers helping at the Baby Bank today - Carol, Helen and Sheila K. Carol spent most of her time on her knees in one corner. No it wasn’t the naughty corner - she was diligently giving donated clothes a third and final check before folding them up and placing them in the appropriately labelled boxes. Meanwhile Helen and Sheila K were sizing, sorting and folding up a mountain of recyclable bags. Bags of fun for sure!

Just a quick update on Friday morning at the baby bank . Karen worked through the all the newly donated shoes and got them all sorted and organised. Sheila K tackled the large sock drawer donations sorting this out all morning!

Carol and Helen were second-checking the clothes and putting them away. Once the table started to clear, Karen and Helen moved on to the bags of new clothing donations and started sorting those into first-check piles. It was a very productive morning despite the heat!

Another busy morning at the Baby Bank. 4 of us were put on the dreaded door duty - answering the door and accepting donations and handing out referral packs to the health professional requester. We were kept extremely busy, checking that donated prams, cots etc met all the safety standards and had the correct bits and pieces before we could accept them. We got our steps in carrying clothes and toy donations upstairs for checking. Everyone rose to the challenge and we all learnt much more about what can be accepted and also how to collapse modern prams! Sheila A was also put in charge of the referral phone for the first time, checking off when referrals were ready for collection, where they had been put, and when they had been collected. Rebecca and Lauren were extremely grateful for our help, freeing them up to do other things Sarah was upstairs - sorry, I didn't get a chance to catch-up with what you were doing, but I'm sure it was mega!

It was another busy Friday at the Baby Bank. Six GoodGymers joined other regular volunteers plus a large group from a local company on a Social Responsibility Day. While Sarah was putting together referral packs for families, the others got on with sorting clothes. It was first time that Sheila K, Carol and Helen had been given this task but with help from old hands Carol and Sheila A, they quickly got to grips with ensuring that nothing got through that was dirt, too worn or too bobbly. We want to treat the recipient families with respect and only give them good quality clothes and equipment. Huge kudos to Sheila K for running all the way there - and all the way back!