33 Goodgymers ran 4-5k to help Little Village Camden Branch make cots and wrap gifts for local mum's

Welcome along to the newbies - Lizzy & William - great to have you along!

In the news this week:

1. It's my last GoodGym Camden on 14th August, I'd love you guys to all come along for the run and the pizza + beers party afterwards.
2. It's the GoodGym Olympics on Saturday, come along from midday for the best day of the year! Last minute events may be avaliable.
3. Lots of community missions happening this week - including a Friday one helping Story Garden.

Corrrr what a fun evening! A lovely big turnout, a wholesome task and a nice run to finish.

Kat led the group for a 1km loop while Liz and I walked over to the task. Sarah and her colleague from Little Village Camden Branch where very much ready for us. They explained how their project helps to work as an gift bank where people donate anything from cots to soap, these are then sorted and then distributed to local families.

We split into eight groups for the task, the first of which packed and wrapped products as a present to local mum's. Over 40 minutes the team worked hard packing these presents up, filling boxes and boxes!

Everyone else was put in groups of 3-4 people to make up seven different cots (including a Boris Toddler!), they were all different and only one came with instructions. The task was to put the cots together, check they had all the parts needed, make sure everything was safe and then write out clear instructions for the donors to use.

Helping local mum's and babies!

Each team had it's own method to building and writing out the instructions. Over 40 minutes all the teams completed the tasks set, with Chris' team finishing first and arguably Dharmesh's team having the hardest to put together. Two teams managed to get onto a second cot but unfortunately both missed parts.

It was nice to have a different task that didn't involve weeds or woodchip, it involved lots of team work and everyone did great - well done!

After taking a group picture Kat led the group for a run around the canals and Granary Square - nice!

Sign up for next week here, task(s) tbc.

PB out

28 GoodGymers ran 4-8k to help St Christopher's Place and St Mungo's!

Thanks for coming along guys! The GG Monthly Social is tonight in Old Street at the Prince Arthur from 6.30pm - sign up here.

I'm sad to say I will be leaving my role as Camden Trainer in August, I'm going to be moving to Sheffield to do a Masters. I'll miss you all very much and of course we'll have a leaving party!

St Mungo's Report:

Eleven of us headed of to help a new task up near Swiss Cottage - St Mungo's! This is a fantastic homeless charity that has sites all over the London and the UK. We had a lovely run up there, avoiding Primrose Hill and passing some big houses. Upon our arrival Kat and Will met us to make our group thirteen!

Our task was simple but effective to clear all and any weeds in four parts of the garden, open up the back garden as it was heavily outgrown and bag up any dead plants that were already piled up. Splitting into two's, three's and four's we got to work and made a huge impact in 20 minutes - Abi said it was the hardest she'd ever worked at GoodGym - nice!

Overall we collected up 17 bags of weeds, debris and rubbish - well done! After a group picture we headed home via Primrose Hill for the view and lesson of running downhill - all the fun.

Poo Hand Kate

St Christopher's Report:

The other group went to St. Christopher's where they pulled up weeds (assisted by "the weed lady" and a small child), cut down a sapling that had pretensions of being a tree, and swept/cleaned the area. Katie unfortunately seems to put her hand in cat poo, and then proceeded to do the run after with her hand stretched out to one side trying not to hit anyone haha.

This was the first time we went to help this task for over a year, they are connected to Camden's Origin Housing consortium and always appreciate our help. After the task was completed Frances led a 3.5k run via the canal and Granary Square to home.

Sign up for next week here when we'll be helping Cecil Sharp House and another task (tbc).

PB out.