The wind died down and the weather was quite pleasant for finishing off the path at the King's meadow.

We efficiently dug in the remainder of the edging and spread out what was left of the woodchip (which was actually quite a lot!

Job done!

Four York GG-ers braved the increasing winds (and a bit of rain) to join Gordon back at the King's Path wildflower meadow. Our job today was to create a brand new path from a fence (where they hope to eventually put in a gate) across to the main path. We welcomed Estella to her very first GG task!

We laid out the planks of wood for the edging roughly 1 metre apart (or a shovel's width as we decided that would do!) and some speedy spade work ensued, creating narrow trenches for the edging planks. Once the planks were in position, the wood chip was wheelbarrowed down the path to create a nice, soft surface. We created a somewhat kinky-shaped path (or rustic as we at GG York like to say) up to the wood chip pile when we ran out of time. We will be back soon to finish off the last few metres of this new path so that it joins up to the main path.

Nine of us GG Yorkies met Gordon for another task at the King's Path Wildflower Meadow in Acomb. Kudos to Ellie who brought along Stewart for his first ever GG task - give him some cheers! Also well done to Max who brought along a friend who lives very close to the task so she was roped in as well - thanks Laura for your help! Thanks also to Michal who brought along some of his own tools.

We split into 2 teams each side of the fence. One team started to dig up the self-seeded trees whilst the other team started digging holes around the edge of the wildflower meadow. We soon took delivery of several trees over the fence and planted them in record time. We moved and replanted approximately 15 trees in under 40 minutes. We were also joined by a local councillor who was interested in the project and our progress so far. We look forward to watching these young trees grow over the coming years.

In the process we managed to tick off several of our January Bingo challenge tasks, including muddy shoes (see photo - although some had already been cleaned off by the time I took the photo).

As is customary on a Friday, we headed to a local café for some well-earned refreshments.

Three hardy GG Yorkies braved the murky and drizzly weather to meet Gordon, along with another volunteer, back at the Kings Meadow. This was our last chance to dig out those pesky docks as the wildflower 🌸seeds were ready to be planted.

We dug the docks for almost an hour, gathering huge clods of mud on our boots 🥾in the process. Some of the most innocent looking leaves on the surface had the thickest and longest roots!

We then began to sow the wildflower seeds, each taking sections (3 fence panels wide) and scattering the seeds, trying to make sure we didn't run out before we got across the whole section. The wind may have meant that some seeds were stuck to our boots 🥾too! We hope to see a lovely display of wildflowers next year.

We met Gordon again to tackle more of those pesky docks. The whole area has now been rotavated but the weeds have popped up again with avengeance. The ground was very soft due to recent rain so each root came up with a huge clod of earth which we did our best to remove before piling them up under the nearby trees.

We were joined by a couple of young lads (who Gordon knew) who lived close by and wanted to help. They didn't have the GG staying power and left after about half an hour but their help was very welcome.

After 45 minutes of digging out the docks, with the light fading and several inches of mud on our shoes, we called it a day. We've only tackled a small area but every little helps! Gordon has grand plans for the area and has already planted some shrubs and plans to sow the wildflower seeds soon.

To celebrate my birthday I met a bunch of other GG Yorkies in Acomb to continue helping to create the Kings Path wildflower meadow. A second attempt at rotavating had taken place but unfortunately it still only managed to cover a small area of the ground. So, once again, we were back to digging up the docks with our trusty spades and forks. Despite some only having small leaves above ground, we found they had some impressive roots and were very satisfying to remove.

We were "helped" by Fergie the dog who really loved to chew the roots as they were dug up, even stealing them back out of the bag before we could transport them over to the dumping pile under the trees. We had to make sure we didn't dig up Fergie instead of the docks as he ran around.

After an hour we had dug up enough roots to make quite an impressive pile and went off to the pub to celebrate my birthday along with some of my home-made birthday brownies!