To end off 2022 and to celebrate Xmas, we visited our friends at Redmayne View Housing with Care, for an evening of carol singing, mulled wine, mince pies and chocolate fountains... they sure know how to look after us.

It was a wonderful evening and we provided the residents with a festive night they'll always remember.

Merry Christmas everyone!

We all arrived at Lodge Lane Infant School to find a very overgrown old chicken pen full of self-seeded trees and thistles. Feeling somewhat daunted, we set about clearing with the few tools we had and lots of elbow grease! Emrys had plenty of sticks to keep him busy and enjoyed sitting in the middle of the action. It was Rose's first mission and she got stuck in immediately, tackling some old creepers that had made their way over the garden. Jonathan and Bobby made short work of the surrounding bushes and Helen took on a tough patch of old potatoes. Bek and Elizabeth worked wonders weeding and pruning until we could even see some soil! Meanwhile, some parent volunteers tackled the grass on the other side of the chicken coop. We found a big frog under one of the trees who kept us and the children amused by popping out every now and then! By the end of the mission, it looked like a different garden and we know the school can't wait to use it to do some planting with the children.

Thanks Penny for the pun!

Tonight 12 GoodGymers ran and cycled 6km to the Norwich Foodbank run by the Trussel Trust.

At the task we split into 2 groups, to unwrap boxes full of donated supermarket items - shaving foam, rice pudding and instant Mash!

All the donations were packed into crates, labeled and piled up in different corners of the warehouse.

After 40 minutes and many crates filled, we were finished. Keith thanked us for our efforts and invited us to return for more packing.

Cleaning the GoGo Discover trails is always a fun task, and produces great some great photos, how many T-Rex's can you spot?

A big welcome to Nicky and Paul (my brother from another mother) who were taking part in their first GoodGym encounters.

The lovely Sarah was making an appearance after moving to New Zealand 3.5 years ago, sadly its just a flying visit but we really appreciate her making the effort to come to GoodGym while she's back.

So tonight's task was to clean as many of the T-Rex's as we can... and as you can see from the photos, we did a lot of them!!!

The hard work was rewarded with a visit to the pub.

NB: there is no spelling mistake in the pun.

Tonight we welcomed Maddy on her first GoodGym encounter, as she was visiting with Joel who is briefly returning to the UK (and GG Norwich) after moving overseas just over 3 years ago.

Well done to Alina who has recently completed 25 good deeds!!!

Tonight's task was returning to Somerleyton Gardens. With the dry ground, it was a rather challenging task to dig! Some of the tasks we completed included:

• Chopping back some overgrown brambles (this got people very thorny).
• Creating a new path.
• Filling up the water butts.
• Chopping down some old dead branches.
• Trimming back some of the dead plants.
• Litter pick.

As you can see, it was a very busy evening with a great turnout. This warranted a well deserved pub trip.

Next week we will be cleaning the GoGo T-Rex's