As the summer draws to the close (I know, ever the optimist… but it IS meteorological Autumn on the 1st September!), it seems only fair that this report is a comp(ost)ilation of our Greatest Gardening Puns. The GoodGym equivalent of Now That’s What I Call… Puns, if you will. To give a bit of context before the puns begin, this community mission was all about clearing up the staff garden at the Isleworth Centre, where several NHS services are based.

In true mission style, it looked like a bit of a jungle, albeit far tamer than some that we’ve come a-cropper with this Summer. It may have felt like we couldn’t Cedar wood from the trees at first, but GoodGym rose to the occasion and showed that, after a summer of gardening tasks, we are blossoming into budding gardeners.

We weren’t entirely sure what we needed to do (Samia’s vague brief of “make it less like a jungle” was as clear as mud), but there was a specific request to conker the overgrown Wisteria/bindweed combination that was making getting to the bike shed a twice daily mission in itself.

Leaf it to me",

Caroline said, and shear-ly enough, within a matter of minutes she had hacked away, once and flor-al defeating the foliage. Bloom!

Holly took an early bath in the water feature but showed true determination to get to the root of the problem (or whatever seemed to be growing inside it). Although she seemed to have disappeared under a plant, Laura seemed fine and dande(lion) with a spot of weeding.

Squat’s the problem?

We’ed brambled across a thorny issue. Brambles that seemed to have no end. But they didn’t leave us stumped, and in a couple of sec(ateur)s we’ed shown them who’s boss.

Andy quite literally branched out and decided to brave felling the tree-like plant. After trying to figure out the best plan(t) of attack, we arrived at a deciduous and took the Alley Approach to tree-tment. With branches falling in various directions, all that could be said (or shouted) was Tree-ware!

Tree-hacking in action with @GGHounslow pic.twitter.com/43H6hyr8BL

— GoodGym Richmond (@GGRichmon) August 25, 2018

As we've learned from the various jungle hacking expeditions, don’t judge a book by it’s clover. Jane summed it up brilliantly in that it was a truly satisfying mission to see the fruits of our labour. Turns out that the staff garden is trying to give Kew Gardens a run for its money, with us finding that some trees had tree number tags on them - the things you discover on a mission, eh….

We could barely beleaf what we’d achieved in little over an hour, it’s had quite the faceleaft.

And we didn’t rake the fine weather for granted, quite the releaf that the rain is forecast for tomorrow instead.

Before and after the @GGHounslow community mission: @goodgym giving Groundforce a run for their money pic.twitter.com/4FocS7b1jq

— GoodGym Richmond (@GGRichmon) August 26, 2018

Puns aside, a massive thank you to all 8 legends who rocked up this morning on a bank holiday weekend to help out with some gardening for a bunch of NHS services in Hounslow. All legends in your own right, but a special shoutout and whoop to Claire who joined us for her first GoodGym experience - welcome Claire, it was lovely to have you join us and hope to see you again. Our WhatsApp group was alive and kicking during my long run to Isleworth (it was definitely Isle(worth) getting up early for!), so here are some of the highlights:

• Awesome work Jane with parkrun volunteering before the mission - we salute you.

• Well done to Africa on your first Parkrun this morning and huge thank you for making it after a nightshift last night too!

• Holly impressively ran after having done a week of Plan B - it may have been a tough run, but you did it!

• Brilliant to have Laura back up to running 6km for the third time this week - nailing that IT band rehab. And double-deeding this weekend with a mission lined up for tomorrow, you’re a hero.

• Thanks for repping Hounslow Andy - no jungle mission is complete without you (thank you for felling the tree!). And thank you for your IT/GIF-making support and patience.

• Big-up to Caroline for repping Kingston and going well beyond the goal she set a few months back of running 10km - and for going onwards to a coach visit too. Brilliant stuff!

Tools away, we finished bang on lunge-time. And again, apologies for the tree-dious read...