Monday’s Richmond Group Run took off from the Tap Tavern, speeding out along the Thames Path towards Buccleuch Gardens, Richmond for our monthly task at The Three Pigeons Plot and The Arcade Rockery. With tools and equipment ready to go, Anita was standing outside the Arcade. Ken and Adam had already woken up a leaf blower to say good-bye to the blanket of leaves, dropped by the towering London Plane trees surrounding the Arcade.

A bollard downed was put back in place by Salwa and Liz.

And Sam, Katie, Susan, Jp and Lucy pitched in to weed, sweep and prune.

A struggling Christmas box was given a new home by Rosie.

And pretty soon the Arcade was looking awesome and spry.

Everyone pitched in, sweeping up leaf debris, Composting weeds, bagging up leaves, everyone a community hero. With all our equipment packed, we were ready to leave, jetting back to the Tap Tavern for our monthly social. We do know when we’ll be back again (at Buccleuch Gardens): Monday 12th December for a festive gardening session. Enough said, I have to go. Anita (with apologies to John Denver).

Following on from our epic root dig at the war memorial at St Mary Magdalene Church in Richmond centre, we returned to continue the good work in time for Rememberance services.

Four GoodGymers met 19 volunteers from the community at St Mary Magdalene Church to finish the restoration project. This involved a huge task of removing two tonnes of excess soil which then had to be scattered thinly and discretely throughout the church yard so it was invisible as Ken said “like feeding chickens.”

With the excess soil discreetly spread, the group set about planting for both now ans seasons to come. In total the group planted an amazing 3,100 bulbs of snowdrops, tulips, alliums, and daffodils and 258 plants of cyclamen, geraniums, deer ferns and Mexican daisies. All followed up with a good sweep to clean up from all that digging!

It was a task that truly earned the GoodGym title with a lot of physical work. An extra special mention goes out to Anita and Sam who stayed late and slaved away to ensure the project was all done by 2pm. A very satisfying result from before to after which makes a real difference to this space in the community.

A morning shift at City Harvest's Acton Park depot, with bonus Kefir.

Normal sorting and crating duties in the chiller were interrupted by a 10am a delivery of 8 pallets of suplus/short-dated dairy products requiring all the volunteers to focus on getting it crated up for immediate re-distribution. Three of us made short shrift of a couple of pallets of Kefir.

An awesome evening of GoodGym Gardening in Buccleuch Gardens Richmond, in Two Acts.

‘’Act One ‘’ A determined focus on an array of tasks at The Three Pigeons Plot with a fast and furious 25mins resulting in:

1.  Litter picked.

1. Weeds around the riverside railings and lamp- post annihilated.
2. Leaves around the Plot and adjacent parking spaces swept and composted.
3. Gravel area precision weeded. ‘’Act Two’’

A blitzkrieg approach at The Arcade Rockery and Compost Heap, working against the clock and somehow managing to accomplish one hell of a lot :

1. Compost heap completely turned (revealing fabulous compost for future use)
   1. Lawn border raked and weeded,
   2. Stachys (lambs ears) relocated and watered-into newly weeded rockery.

‘’Finale’’ A group photo in the Arcade Compost Heap (undignified but original) followed by a victory run back to the Tap Tavern. Congratulations to Lucy on getting stuck right in to her first GoodGym session.

Evening 4-8pm shift at City Harvest in Ealing. Not much sorting and crating of food to be done so spent most of the shift cleaning crates and totes in the industrial washer and finding innovative ways to stack them for drying. All going well until the very end and the very last crate of the shift when the filter became blocked and water started flooding out.

Shaking off a chill in the air with a jog up the hill led by Jack and back down into Petersham Common to meet Ken with his high-vis vests, bags and litter pickers.

We set to work collecting sadly discarded rubbish. Bags and bags were collected from the roadside, most likely thrown from passing vehicles. Amongst it all, many cans, wrappers, a shoe, a BMW badge, a parking penalty notice and a random number 27!

Our run came in at 5km with one member opting to walk and another cycling: there are always options for those who want to run less, walk, cycle or meet at the task.

This run marked 50 good deeds for Rebecca who wore the sash with pride and enjoyed legendary celebration brownies by Salwa in the pub after.