"Everything's growing so fast with the rain." - Mrs C

...and it was only March. The task that Kash and Sevan had been asked to help with wasn't a burst of spring growth. It had been years in the making. A tree planted before Mr and Mrs C moved into their house was now crowding over their patio and most importantly for Mrs C, getting in the way of their washing line. Mr C used to take care of it. For the past 3 years he hadn't been able to, so a big slice needed to be taken off one side.

"Don't take too much off. A bit less [than the first cut]." - Mrs C
*"We'll make sure we don't kill the tree." - Sevan

Armed with a pair of baby loppers, shears and 2 saws, the branches were cut well back to the point of having no leaves left on the problematic side of the tree. It would still have plenty of strength and life though. As well as the baby loppers, there were mummy, daddy and baby ladders too which were all used. The biggest ladder almost allowed Sevan to reach the top of the tree. On a gusty day, he needed to be careful to keep his balance.

With the cutting and clean up done in an hour (include Kash taking a broom to the tree), Mrs C and Kash saw the opportunity to tidy up more bushes in the garden.

"Can you take a little bit off this?"
"A little bit off this one too...?" - Mrs C

Kash was only too happy to keep chopping.

When Kash and Sevan finished, Mr and Mrs C would not only be able to hang their washing up. They'd also have a lot more sun on their patio, which is perfect for the coming spring, as long as that rain holds off.

At the destination of a 20-minute jog to a mission in Islington stood an imposing mansion with an artistic name, an impressive lobby, and bright, sunlit corridors. Sevan and Kash learnt from their beneficiary, Ms M, who lived there, that a beautiful façade does not always mean a well-maintained, functional interior. The lady couldn't even enjoy the view of her building as she was partially blind. While awaiting a cataract operation, she depended on volunteers to help her with reading the correspondence.

The three assumed seats at the table in the sun-soaked living room and attended to a small stack of papers. The first from the top was a beauty salon leaflet that Ms M planned to visit. Sevan spelt the contact details to the beautician, which Ms M wrote with a sharpie using very large letters on an A4 sheet and filed away. The three envelopes to go through consisted of a political campaign leaflet and two important letters regarding money matters.

"When we get the mail these days, it's not happy news. People don't send love letters anymore.", Ms M observed.

It was hard not to agree with her that the art of composing thoughtful letters to loved ones was in decline.

With all the letters read out aloud, large-letter notes taken and filed, the three spent the rest of the mission time chatting about the impacts of AI on the job market, the diminishing critical thinking skills in modern society and the benefits of healthy, homemade food. Ms M revealed herself as a well-travelled individual and a Chinese medicine practitioner, who strongly believed in the empowering role of mindset in healing.

After the enriching conversation, Sevan and Kash left Ms M grateful for the assistance and hopeful about her upcoming surgery. She was full of a positive outlook about regaining her sight and independence, which was very important to her.

Windy but dry Thursday session on the track. The wind didnt stop runners, guides, wheelchair racers and our lovely dogs from going out and getting stuck into a great session. Maybe the wind helped to go quicker or not : possible excuse 🤔. Gone with the wind - blown away by everyone's performance tonight.

Had a lot of fun chipping in at Graham Street Park with some composting. It's a lovely park of town by the canal. Nice to see some familiar faces as we worked as a close knit team to work away at the two small compost heaps. We had a little bit of a scare early on as we were threatened to be kicked out by a park keeper but we managed to negotiate a bit more time to finish the job. A proper workout with plenty of forking and shoveling to be had. Thanks Eslam for having us and I'm sure we'd happily return if there's more to do in the coming months.

We were back at Sunnyside Community Gardens to finish off last week's compost turning. Taking inspiration from the recent Winter Olympics, we applied avalanche rescue snow-removal techniques to moving compost: using a "V" formation with three rows of diggers passing dirt back to the next, forming a nice efficient chain effect.

Great team effort - we were able to complete the compost bay that had totally defeated us last week.

Now it's over to the worms to do work their magic...

Myself and Ivo had a lovely time with Mr P.

Though we both we were both travelling by bike from Bethnal Green, we were not organised enough to coordinate doing the journey together! When we arrived, Mr P had all the tools ready and showed us what needed to be done. The main task he wanted to focus on was cutting back the branches of his tree in the front garden.

Mr P gave me a masterclass in how to use a telescopic lopper, so I tackled the high up bits with that while Ivo went for the lower hanging branches with a garden sheers. As we finished up with the tree, the shining sun gave us the energy we needed to tackle some weeds afterwards and leave Mr P with a tidier looking front garden.

Unfortunately most of the photos we took reveal the address so I've just left some zoomed in pictures of the tree before and after.