Aggregating on with it

On a lighter evening (hoorah!) 20 runners covered 5km and helped shift a whole load of gravel at Beecroft Garden Primary School.

Yes! The clocks went forward, life is good. We had a busy weekend again, with runners off visiting older people, either for a chat, or to help out with a task in their home. If you want to find out more about this, have a look here. At one mission, runner Samuel very quietly completed his 50th good deed! Samuel doesn't generally come along on a Monday, so most of these have been helping older people. Well done Samuel! Why not see what he and Nykolette got up to and also give him a cheer?!

This week we welcomed Sarah along for her first run with GoodGym Lewisham (she has been part of GoodGym Camden for a few years, but now lives closer to us), how exciting! Lewisham Love to you!

We have been visiting the Sensory Garden at Beecroft Garden Primary School for a few months now and have really seen it grow and develop from an ugly wall, piled high and overgrown, to a series of easily accessible, wide steps, an indoor calm space and an area for new planting. This week we were visiting to take the project another leap forward by lifting, shifting and spreading a massive amount of gravel.

Big thanks to Kim for running up front again this week with Amber (and for leading the stretches at the end, superbly done) and to Jacqueline, Itmari and Chloe for back-marking and keeping everyone together, what a team!

It was such a joy being out in the daylight, the sky orange, with little fluffy clouds. On arrival at the school, Jules and Gemma very quickly showed us the work that has happened since our last visit - wow! The steps, fence and some trellises are now painted a lovely plummy shade and everything looks so much more solid! Gathering wheelbarrows and shovels (or spades?), we made our way round to the skip area, where there were a number of massive sacks of aggregate and gravel.

One group got busy shovelling this into buckets and trugs, while another group wheeled these back around to the garden, where others tipped it all out onto the steps. As this went on, a smaller team continued painting, chatting as they worked, about races such as 'Race the Horse' and 'Race the Train' (yes, such races exist!). Around at the gravel mound, talk had turned to pies and whether there is a time of year for pie (I think it's perfectly fine to eat pie all-year-round). Being in a Sensory Garden, there are some magical touches but, at one point, I thought I could see two little elves at work in the corner. As I got closer, I could see it was Itmari and Will, working carefully to sand the rough edges of a hand-made xylophone (beautifully crafted by Gemma, using old zimmer-frames!). Just as we approached 8pm, the light had fallen slightly, but was still just bright enough to take a group photo, making use of the part-filled steps. We will be back!

As is often the case on a trip to Crofton Park, we are drawn to the slopes of Hilly Fields, with a few repeats pushing us up and pulling us down. With one last push to the top, we admired the view over towards Canary Wharf before easing down the hill back to our start point. Kim took us through our stretching paces this week - thank you - and we looked forward to next Monday, when we will be off over to Ewart Road Clubhouse, our first trip there in about a year! Expect a nice outdoor task and a run of about 7km in total.

See you soon!