Monday: check. Brilliant turnout: check. Great task: check. Dog at GoodGym: check. Every box for a perfect start to the week was checked as we met for a marvellous Monday at Stepney Bank Stables.

A great group tonight for the session helping our hosts Stepney Bank Stables with a clear-up job to get the top stables spick and span ahead of Saturday’s Ouseburn festival where visitors are able to take a tour. Stepney Bank Stables is a fabulous community project and if you’ve never been make sure to pop in on Saturday if you can.

It was great to see Dan and Ellie back for their second task in three days as we don’t get to see them for months at a time. We also welcomed back Matt who did his first ever GG task at the weekend. Damu arrived in a celebratory mood tonight too with a pint in hand from The Cluny! That’s a good way to enhance GoodGym performance I’m sure.

Lots of elbow grease was required for the task this evening: brushing, scraping and flicking being three key actions for effective cobble cleaning. None of this is glamorous (apart from perhaps using a leaf blower) and Louise also got stuck into some heavy duty cobweb clearing despite a dodgy knee. Best of all, Dan’s wheelbarrow skills were required- always a happy sight. You’ll also see from the photos Ellie had the very impawtant job of keeping Stepney Bank Stables resident Good Boy Scout company for much of the evening.

Before long 45 minutes had passed and the yard looked sparkling - check out the before and after photos!

With a very squeezed amount of time we headed back for a team challenge to find and photograph three things using whichever strategy they saw fit: something that makes you smile, a living creature or insect and three street name signs. There were only five seconds in it at the end so it was pretty much a draw in my eyes.

Thanks everyone, a really positive start to the week.

On a Sunny Saturday morning five GoodGymers helped at an allotment belonging someone who grows vegetables which benefit the local community. We have helped at at these allotments overall perviously and it was lovely to see the raised beds in which we helped level the ground for. Dispite this I still managed to start going to wrong location and so I was a bit late and everyone else had already gotten stuck in.

We weeded and turned the soil in three seperate beds, moved logs and put down weed fabric (which we keep confusing with weed membrane) over the parts we had dug over, fully preparing the beds for the allotment owner to be able to plant vegetables now.

While doing this we found an ant colony, butterfly larvae and a really unusual white moth.

The report title comes from Chris's possibly made up words about the amount of tangled and intertwined weeds and vines, and the 'islands' of unturned soil we were each stood of as we lossen the soil around us. The name of a goodgym album perhaps?

Lucy declared this task the biggest difference she had seen in a while and I would have to agree, as you can see in the before, after and with weed frabic pictures and the picture of the bags of weeds we removed from the plot!