Dog Days are Over - Florence and the Handtools

Full of excitement for a daylight run, now that British Summertime has begun (could someone tell the weather?!), Oxford Goodgymers assembled to run to the newly established community space, Flo's The Place in the Park. A hop, skip and a jump away from our base at East Oxford Community Centre, aka 2km, Flo's is a pretty spot with a lot going on even though it only opened in October. Winding our way through the back streets between Iffley and Cowley Roads we made light work of the first run, before meeting our very own paparazzi David Brugman from Oxford Green Week, and being greeted by Makena, our task owner for the evening.

Makena had two tasks for us to tackle at Flo's - both for the nursery. Two picnic benches needed sanding down and cleaning up to prepare them for being painted, and some of the railings around the edge of the outdoor play space needed boards secured over them to try and stop dogs squeezing through into the play area. We could immediately see the importance of this job given the dog poo we spotted just the other side of the fence.

Dividing into teams we got to work. No power tools here, just good, old fashioned arm strength: It's the Goodgym way!

45 minutes later, we had 2 boards secured to the railings and ready to be painted with blackboard paint, and 2 picnic benches sanded down. Many hands make light work. We were rewarded with some some tadpole-watching, which was strangely fascinating! Nurseries have all the best things.

After a brief stop for a group photo, to be used in the Oxford Green Week photo competition, we maximised the remaining daylight by enjoying a jog around the park, and then due to my over-excitement at having bought cones this week we had a brief game of cone-flip, followed by 'heads, shoulders, knees, and cone'.

The route home proved a bit of a magical mystery tour for many - best leave a trail of breadcrumbs in future!

Welcome to Sarah, joining us for the first time this week, and many thanks to David Brugman for the two group photos.

Next week is our 10th Group Run, so let's go for a drink/icecream/bagels afterwards.