High energy, positive vibes and a big impact - it's all in a night's work at GoodGym Westminster!

It was amazing to welcome members of North Paddington Youth Club to our session last night. Waleed, MJ and Husan have all been making some incredible stuff happen, from foodbank collections, to walking cricket for the elderly, big cleans ups and more. Why not check out upcoming sessions and join them?

We also gave a big welcome to Vita who came along to her very first group run - great to meet you Vita!

We met up in a busy Hyde Park with no sign of the predicted storm, and found a place away from the army of bikes streaming in for our warm up. We tested our brains as well as muscles which was a challenge - and resulted in some 'interesting' high fives! After a quick discussion about our chosen super power (super strength rated very highly, although you all already seem to have that) we set off for the task.

The Abbey Centre in Victoria is an important resource for local people, offering support in the form of hot food, legal advice, somewhere warm, therapy and classes. Our job was outside in the garden, so we made our way through the building and divided up the jobs.

Laura and Catarina got straight in making sandwiches for rough sleepers, Waleed, MJ and Hussan grabbed gloves and cleared the weeds (I think that geranium survived!), Kush gave everything a good water, Ciaran and Vita were in charge of clearing and sweeping, Emma and Lydia were on banister and fire escape duty, while Jacob worked with photographer Simon to capture some fantastic shot for the evening. You can see the whole gallery here - what a lot of happy, energetic faces!

Before long the jobs were done and the place was transformed - brilliant work everybody. That wasn't all though - there was just enough time for a fitness challenge which saw us test our balancing skills. Turns out they were very impressive, even when I threw in a few dynamic exercises to test you all! We finished off the night with a leg burner in the form of a progressive squat.

While some of us went for a delicious curry, others opted to add a few miles, and we also managed to catch the Under One Sky Team to hand over the carefully prepared sandwiches. They had run out of food to hand out to rough sleepers, so we were there in the nick of time!

Great to see you all last night, thanks for all the effort and smiles. We run as a group every single Tuesday in Westminster at the same time. Next week we're off to the oldest youth club in the world to help out - would love to see you there!

Last night’s GoodGym Wandsworth run had community impact, zombie related content, a lot of manure, and some EMOMs that made sure no one noticed the freezing temperatures.

We kicked things off with a warm-up and a chat about how the January Challenge has been going. We've logged plenty of good deeds but we're still only 75% of the way there - can you help us get there? There’s still time to add to the total this Saturday's community mission in Doddington followed by coffee ☕️.

Before heading off, we paused to celebrate something pretty special: Jordan’s 300th Good Deed. From missions to group runs, socials and celebrations sessions Jordan has shown up to make Wandsworth a better, more community-minded place to live. A great milestone and one that deserves cheers (and cake, next week, when we'll have even more to celebrate!)

We also tackled the big question of the evening: who would you want on your team in a zombie apocalypse? The shortlist was eclectic. Bear Grylls (obvious survival skills), Barack Obama (calm leadership and negotiation under pressure) and Claudia Winkleman (great fringe). Strong team. The Zombies wouldn’t stand a chance.

Then it was time to run – heading up to Age UK Wandsworth Day Centre. This day centre is a vital community resource, offering support, connection and activities for older residents – a place that helps people stay active, social and independent. Spaces like this really make a difference in people's lives.

Our task involved two massive piles of manure which needed spreading across the garden beds. Tools were initially in short supply, but this is GoodGym – we adapt, we improvise, we get it done. With a bit of teamwork and some impressive resourcefulness we dispersed the manure and also squeezed in a big tidy-up of the surrounding area, leaving everything noticeably more welcoming.

With the task complete, it was straight into a fitness session in the car park. The workout? A EMOM (every minute on the minute) session featuring lunges, shuttle runs and squat jumps which kept the cold at bay. Strong effort all round.

Looking ahead to next week: we’ve got more milestones to celebrate, another great task, and then our monthly pub quiz. See you there!

Brenda, Anastasia and Gosia attended a mission in Southwark today - Ms P needed help with moving out of her property (which will be soon taken down 🏗).

We arrived at 1 pm and buzzed 🔔 two times before her relative came in and made us realise that we were not buzzing at all 😆. We were then welcomed by Ms P in the ground floor kitchen 🍽 area.

First impression was that there was still a lot of furniture and stuff around the house and clearly a lot of work still to be done! We knew that we won't tackle all but we could still try our best 🫡 and also prioritise the tasks that require few pair of hands.

At first, we were tasked with taking out a washing machine. Befre doing that we needed to unplug it and also disconnect from the waterpipes (which brought a bit of thrill as we were nor sure if water was already disconnected or we are going to flood 💦 the kitchen). Once free, we pushed it outside of the house to a designated place right to the waste collection area 🗑. After that we tackled few more items from there and then moved to the first floor.

We have spent most of the time emptying the upstair bedroom 🛏. This included taking out a bed frame, chest of drawers, curtains, a number of boxes 📦📦🗃 full of papers and stuff. Some of them were to be kept, some of them to be taken outside. What was incredibly useful was an inbuilt lift inside the house which Ms P - who uses a wheelchair - typically used to move around the house. We used it to transport items (especially the heavier ones 🏋‍♀️).

We were also given a special mission of taking down a lamp shade. Nimble Anastasia stood on the bed to unscrew it along with the bulb 💡. The shade went to the bin but we have put back the bulb which still worked (!) even after an accidental fall 😆.

We then moved to the bathroom and were asked to take whatever we can straight to the bin. Nothing unusual to report other than the bag that seemed very sturdy didn't cope that well with the load and one of it's handles snapped when we were going down the stairs. All under control 👌 and after few moments were were back on track with the move.

Throughout the task we had a little helper 🧒(maybe Ms P grandson) who also moved some of the things out as well as showing of with his toys 🧸🪀 and very cool trainers 👟 (with a small light at the back).

We tried to keep the waste area tidy and do not obstruct the parking area. In a short time the space became pretty crowded so at some point we did a bit of reshuffle to keep them compact and neat 🧹.

We said our goodbye 👋 after finishing with the bathroom. Ms P was very grateful for our help and wished us very well.

Before leaving the property, Anastasia had a great idea to take the hangers (that were planned to be binned) to the near charity shop so they can make use of them to present the clothes for sale.

There's no denying that last night was a bit of a damp squib - but in true GG Hounslow style we made the most of the rainy evening. We grabbed every piece of waterproof clothing we could find (including Gus' fetching plastic trousers), headed out into the drizzle and met with Jo from Wild Chiswick to spread the word about hedgehog habitats.

The last time we delivered leaflets in a different area of Chiswick to let people know what they can do in their gardens to protect the hedgehogs, the charity received three enquiries before the evening was out - so the task has a proven track record of effectiveness. We tried to bear this in mind as we did the rounds of the sodden culs-de-sac!

There have been growing numbers of hedgehogs spotted in the area but it's crucial we do everything we can to help them thrive. They are in decline in Britain and are now listed as vulnerable on Britain's red list of mammals, with numbers falling by up to 30% in urban areas and 50% in rural areas. Wild Chiswick want to let people know what they can do and have volunteers who travel round the area to create hedgehog runs through peoples' gardens so they can find the food sources they need.

After 40 minutes of damp delivering we decided to call it a night and made a run for hot tea, warm pubs and to see if the local water supply had been switched back on - fingers crossed!

Next week the weather is meant to be quite chilly so thankfully we have an indoor task at Chiswick Methodist Church - see you there for a rare toasty task!