We were supposed to be painting a room at Sheffield Futures tonight, but a final check with the team there revealed that the person meant to be meeting us was off. Therefore Plan B was put into action at the last minute. This, of course, was plogging. A contact from the Pitsmoor Pickers was contacted on the off-chance she was free, alas it wasn't meant to be!

Luckily some equipment was at hand from past picking trips, so we didn't have to resort to bare-handed tactics. We decided to visit an area of cycle path which GoodGym takes care of for SusTrans, the route behind the Durham Ox. We cleared this section of cycle path as a team, and even witnessed some people using it for once!!! After this, we headed up the road and across to the opposite side to clear the grass verges and scrubland.

We 'refuse' to quit

After an action figure (see photo) packed time filling a bag full each, we set off in search of a street bin where we could leave our refuse. This involved running in the general direction of the canal, where our route back to the Showroom was planned to go along. We eventually found one, thanks to some superb scouting from Rachel, and left our bags by it to be reported to the Fix My Street app later on. We then continued on to the canal towpath where we were treated to a viewing of some new 'street' art before jogging back to the Showroom to stretch off and refresh.

A new task today with a referral from lovely local charity, the Joybank. They collect second hand toys and books, and find them new homes in schools, playgroups and with underprivileged children. Professionals will refer families and organisations and packages made up, whilst some donations go to the charity shop to be sold to raise funds.

Today at the donation and redistribution centre, we met Beth, who has recently come into a part time role with another colleague to help run this centre and it needs a lot of sorting!

To me, To you!

After a brief, we got down to the hard work and the most useful task we could do was shift some shelving around. Not an easy task when there are boxes and bags full toys and games as far as the eye can see! The hope is that there will be an area where recipients come to collect and can peruse a selection whilst they wait, whilst being kept safely away from the organised chaos behind the scenes!

We discussed future tasks, including sorting through games to make sure they're complete and helping make up gift bags for Christmas/Eid, hopefully being able to facilitate some of these as Monday night group runs