We Were Soil-Mates Again And Had A Wheely Good Time

It feels as if we were never away. Whilst we may not have not been able to meet up in groups, Good Gym has certainly been active during lockdown with all sorts of individual Missions taking place. But what better way to start celebrate the gradual easing of lockdown than with a double header of a Community Mission at La Salle Academy, with the amazing Gerry Proctor. Good Gym is back with a bang. As we are limited to groups of 6 meeting outside, we organised for two groups of 6 to help Gerry out, staggered during the day. But it was so lovely to meet up with people again and there are none finer than a bunch of Good Gymers to spend your time with.

La Salle aims to provide the next generation of hospitality professionals in the Liverpool City Region and beyond and they have partnered with one of the best hospitality educational institutions in our area - Hugh Baird College in Sefton. The students, who attend the academy will be given an unparalleled training so that they can enter on a career pathway that will include the greatest restaurants and hotels in the country. Aspiring to the highest quality of service will be what distinguish us from other providers.

The project is a massive one, not least because they have to kit out an entire building so that it is a functioning hotel but also because they have a kitchen garden, in which they are going to plant fruit and vegetables for use in the hotel academy kitchen. But time is running out and with 20 enormous raised beds to fill with soil, it's Good Gym to the rescue. We had 11 amazing Good Gymer's attending and so a massive thanks go out to Claire, Ruth, Tony, Sam, Ema, Matthew, Rowan, Chris, Roz, Sallyann, Jo and Ema again. In fact a special shout out goes to Ema our new area activator for Liverpool, not only for turning up for her first Community Mission but doing both sessions. Ema

It never ceases to amaze me how the power of Good Gym can act as such a positive force in the community. When 6 people work for an hour and a half and then it gets repeated, a massive amount of work is done and so it was that we managed to get 7 of the raised beds filled. We have been described as being like a budget version of "DIY SOS".

Gerry was really grateful for the help. He is pretty much doing all this on his own and is a volunteer himself. The urgency is that seeds are going to need to be planted in the next few weeks. The plan is to go back again next week and do it all over again and hopefully we can finish off the job and Gerry can get sowing.

And of course no Community Mission would be complete without a pun and because there were two groups, you get two for the price of one.

We are always looking for volunteers to come and help. You don't have to be a runner, we welcome anyone who wants to help out in the community and you don't need to commit to a set minimum amount of time. Don't hesitate to contact us if you want to do good in your community as we have 58 groups across England and Wales.