There was unmistakably feeling of spring in the air last night—lighter evenings, a hint of warmth and a lovely sense of collective optimism. It could only mean a Wednesday group run in Hounslow!

We headed to one of our regular spots, Strand-on-the-Green School, ready to get stuck into a two part task. Paintbrushes in hand, the first team took on the first section of wall. However, there was some consternation about the colour—was it definitely meant to be yellow… or was it supposed to be white? Coverage had to be committed, and before long the wall was getting a proper glow-up.

Team two tackled the other side—pulling, trimming, and liberating the wall from a determined tangle of greenery. There was impressive teamwork, serious progress, and… quite a lot of sneezing. Turns out ivy removal comes with a side of dust clouds, but that didn’t slow anyone down.

As the session progressed there was singing, there were tales of St Paddy's day escapades, there was the satisfying sight of filled bags being lined up, and there was definitely no incident whatsoever involving a paint tin of water. Absolutely none worth mentioning.

By the end, we had a semi transformed space and a skip full of ivy cuttings. Great work everybody. We'll be back on the 1st April to finish up the job.

There’s plenty more to look forward to:

🌱 A mission this weekend at the Eyot ⛪ Gardening at Hope Church—can you make it? 🌼 And next week we're planting cowslips on Turnham Green, plus some fun, longer fitness

It was the second part of our two part task last night at Traid, and it was a race to get everything done before the shop could open the next day completely restocked.

Luckily Delphine and Susan were on hand to help, and bagged themselves a great upper body workout in the process!

Traid is on a mission to stop the harmful effects of fast fashion, and in doing so funds projects all over the world to make sure that everyone who contributes to making our clothing, whether that’s farmers or garment workers and their families, gets fair treatment and control over their own future.

The pile of bags to sort and pack up were very evident from the moment we walked in - a massive blue sea upstairs and a mountain more downstairs to move up.

We started with a warm up, quickly forming a human chain to pass hundreds of bags up the stairs. It was hard work but strangely satisfying!

Our next step was to put clothes on rails. Sounds simple enough but there was more to it. Not only did all the garments have to face the right way with the hanger facing in, but they had to be arranged in a pre determined colour scape which tested our sorting skills! Towards the end of the power hour Gemma, the manager, put us back into our chain formation to bring up the rest of the stock. Turns out it was a great finisher which left us with wobbly arms and the sense of a job well done!

Next Tuesday evening we will have the group task as usual, which is just being confirmed - keep an eye out for next week's challenge.

A great group of people gathered in Wandsworth tonight to do some good! Before setting off, we discussed what we each saw as the first signs of spring with sunlight being high on the wishlist along with flowers blossoming and birds singing - lovely!

We were off to Paradise Gardens to help them move some logs from trees that had been cut down and were lucky enough to spot some spring flowers en route. We got some rather attractive overcoats on to guard against the sap (although some found it to be a fragrant fabric freshener!).

We had a very dedicated team to help sort the existing logs and direct further log placement and we built quite the pile. We finished up with a fitness session with exercises spelling (you guessed it) LOGS!

Well done all and hope you feel the joys of spring this week!

A dark and chilly Wednesday evening, with headtorches at the ready and lots to celebrate – it could only be a GoodGym Hounslow group run! 🎉🏃‍♀️

Before a single sapling had been wrestled or stake hammered into the ground, there was a roll call full of brilliant achievements. First up, a huge round of applause for Beth, fresh from conquering the Tokyo Marathon and jet lag. What a run! 🌏🏅 Lucy smashed a half marathon at the weekend – clearly the marathon training is going well. And then a massive cheer was for Ariane, who tonight completed an amazing 50 Good Deeds. That’s fifty times showing up, pitching in and making our local area better – a brilliant achievement and very well deserved 👏 Not only that, Jon quietly cruised past the 200 good deeds mark. What a serious amount of good done and a real contribution to the community.

If that wasn’t enough excitement for one evening, we also had a brand new group session location - Baron's Ponds. While some GoodGymers have visited the site before for tasks like planting daffs (and we could see the bright and beautiful results of that hard work tonight), this was the first time we’d descended on it as a full group on a Wednesday group run – and there was plenty to do.

The task list was long. It included clearing an area of willow saplings, hammering stakes firmly into the ground and the small matter of moving a four-metre dead hedge. With so much to do, it was an all-hands-on-deck situation. It didn't help that it was dark, the ground was uneven, and there were plenty of brambles - but none of that slowed the team down. Headtorches flashed, saws were pressed into full use, branches were shifted, and gradually the transformation began to appear.

By the end of our 45-minute burst of effort, the area looked completely different. Mark and Pete, the volunteers who manage the site, told us it would have taken them at least half a day to achieve what the group managed tonight. A very satisfying result. 🙌

This weekend there’s another mission at Baron's Ponds, with plenty to get stuck into if you fancy more muddy fun. And next week we’re either back helping out at Chiswick House or teaming up with Wild Chiswick for more community impact.

There’s no stopping GoodGym Hounslow! 💚🏃‍♂️