Chipping off the old block

On Pancake Day eve, we totally flipped out to find we had some lovely new faces to welcome to GoodGym - you batter give a cheer to Areti, Niklas, Jason and Leo who all came along for their first session. Great to meet you all!

After a warm up, our question for the night was, of course, pancake related. What is the best topping? The classics including lemon and sugar and maple syrup made an appearance, and there were some more renegade suggestions such as peanut butter, but ultimately it was nutella that came out on top.

Fueled by the prospect of imminent pancakes, we set off for Paradise Cooperative garden, which was founded in 2014 with the aim of utilising underdeveloped land for urban growing and community gardening. After many years of hard work, volunteers have transformed the abandoned and overgrown site into a beautiful smallholding for local people.

We go regularly to help out, although usually it is with the benefit of a bit more light. Unfortunately a charging error on my part (sorry!) meant that we didn't have our floodlight, which did add an extra challenge to the proceedings. However, we quickly split up into to groups, and undeterred, began to tackle the two jobs for the evening.

The soil shovelers had two enormous raised beds to fill, while the concrete block transporters had the upper body workout to end all workouts, carrying the heavy weights across the garden so that an outside classroom could be built this weekend. What a way to get stacked (I know I'm laying on the pancake puns pretty thick...)

If you'd like to help with the creation of this learning space on Saturday, they'd love the support. You can sign up here to lend a hand and you'll even be rewarded with a free lunch!

Despite the dark we powered through, making great progress. Well done team! We decided that was our task and fitness session in one, so all that was left was to roll back to base for stretches and for the pancake crew to head off for some well deserved sweet treats.

Next week we have an inside (and much better lit!) task helping to paint a community kitchen. Sign up here for some Monday fun spent getting active and doing good. Hope to see you there!