We came into this last group run of January knowing that we needed 12 more good deeds to reach our our January Challenge! Sam was keeping his fingers crossed for at least 12 Southwark members. With 21 sign ups, it was looking hopeful. Slowly, but surely, people started to stream into Old Spike. By 18:45, he looked up at everyone and gave a silent count. 14 faces, but 11 Southwark members... but just as he was about to start his speech, David entered the door. We did it, 200 good deeds in January! Hit both targets having already hit our distance target of 2,000km.

There was a lot to get through tonight, but we started by welcoming Chalomi and Jack from Central Team as well as David and Roberta who came for their second GoodGym session. Yet, tonight was special as not only we were celebrating hitting our targets and GG Southwark's 8th birthday, but Maria after four months and a half from her first good deed hit her 100th! Claiming her wings (and a cake) in the process. Kudos and well done Maria!

Sam went through his usual GG intro speech and his ice-breaker snap-poll and question tonight was about National Croissant Day and National Hot Chocolate Day, which fell on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively. He asked which one is more preferable: croissant or hot chocolate? He also asked, if anyone wanted to share about their January highlights.

For the snap poll and winning by one vote....croissant! People's January highlights included going on holiday, birthdays, raves and learning new skills.

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"Is Stormzy from Southwark?"

After a quick warm-up in the alleyway, Sam led the group out of Old Spike with Maria backmarked (both ways). The idea was to do a loop around Peckham Rye Park but speedy Sam realised parts of the group were behind, so he decided to change it up last minute and do an "out and back" course. It was a busy night in the park with other runners and Peckham Pacers. Yet, after our just under 4k run, we made it back to Old Spike to take a breather and a sip of Athletic Brewing IPAs.

With litter pickers and black bin bags at the ready, we had to split the group into four teams to cover 4 different areas:

• Team Laura who had Alex, Isaac, Louise and Steve covered East Dulwich.
• Team Katy who had just Daryl covered Nunhead.
• Team Paulin who had Andrada, Folarin, Maria, Nathan covered Peckham.
• Team Emma who had Chalomi, David, Lucy, Jack and Roberta covered Queen's Road Peckham.

The rules were simple. Tick off as many items on the litter bingo card in 30 minutes and cover as much distance as the winning team would be determined by items x by distance (in kilometres) = points.

After 30 minutes, each team came back with two bags worth of litter and ticked off their items (out of 25). The results were as following:

• 4th place: Team Peckham = 22 items x 1.75km (38.5 points)
• 3rd place: Team Nunhead = 21 items x 2.75km (57.75 points)
• 2nd place: Team East Dulwich = 23 items x 2.95k (67.85 points)
• 1st place: Team Queen's Road Peckham = 23 items x 3km (69 points)

The winning team took home small body gels from Body Shop. There were awards for those in Southwark that did more than 5 good deeds and covered more than 25 kilometres plus we had cake to celebrate GG Southwark's 8th birthday and Maria's 100th good deed milestone before most of us headed to The Old Nun's Head for a few drinks and pizza!

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Thank You to all the GG-ers

A personal thanks from me to all those who came out last night! I did go off on a faster pace than usual as I was conscious of time. It was a long run, but we managed to squeeze in the 4k run and a litter pick after my longer than usual speech and ice-breaker. Thank you to Maria for backmarking, Paulin, Emma, Katy and Laura for being sub-team leaders for the litter pick bingo. Finally, thank you to all for coming to these group runs in January, we managed to reach our targets!

It may just be me this week - is what I believed...

...BBC Weather had given up - your evening will be bleak - is all they'd said since Sunday... apparently the Daily Snow in Alaska led with - At Least We're Not London... and my Mum texted - surely not shorts, darling? 

Yet our sign ups kept rolling in...

...first it was the GoodGym Central Team, with Chalomi, Ivo, Jacob, Jack, and Kieran - perhaps they want to check up on me, I thought...

...then it was our good-deeding regulars Alison, Jackie, John, Katy, Lici, Louise, and Steve - they sign up for *every* good deed, this lot, I thought...

...and then it was our newer (and very welcome!!!) faces to our community, Akshay and Bozena - did they even know what they'd done(!!), I thought...

Yet - standing in Winter's dark and cold - our wonderful group convened. Thank you, all, I genuinely went through Wednesday feeling like I had a party awaiting in my evening :) 

We kicked things off with our warm up, replacing London for the Wild West, and I do wonder whether passersby were curious about cries of SNAKE IN MY BOOT. A quick few minutes later, our merry group wove our way through Euston and Bloomsbury and onto Tottenham Court Road, where we jumped swiftly into the wonderful American International Church. 

Here for our usual fortnightly slot to set up their C4WS Winter Shelter, we were met by GoodGym friend, Brooke, who set to briefing our team. 

One group (John, Katy, Lici, and Louise, I believe!) quickly set off to do some heavy lifting - shifting AIC's Christmas decorations and recycling 16 large boxes (and thanks for the photo, Katy!)- whilst the other group got to moving chairs and tables, unfurling beds, and fitting clean and warm linen for the evening ahead. We finished by laying out towels and toiletries for the night's guests, leaving a welcoming space. 

I know just how much Brooke and the AIC team appreciate your time and work, everyone - the shelter is a 100% voluntary endeavour - and it wouldn't be possible without the likes of your help - thank you :) 

Our final act was for regular (and lovely) AIC volunteer, Russell, to kindly take our group's photo. On the way home and enjoying Russell's handiwork, twin brother Steve turned and said to me, Alex, why do people always take better photos on your phone than you do...

Here's to next time, all!

On a brisk Wednesday morning, Islington Area Activator Simon caught up with many many familiar faces from the Goodgym HQ team (often from community missions, group runs or our annual Shindig visits) in Chancery Lane, ready for a special trip out of the office. Our plan for the day (as effortlessly scheduled by Chalomi) was to make our way over to Thornhill Square Gardens, a beautiful resident maintained green space between Caledonian Road and Islington. We set off in two separate groups- a walking crew directed by Chalomi and Kim, and a running team hosted by Simon. Our running squad enjoyed a slightly extended route (just under 5km), passing through Fetter Lane, Bell Yard (Dickensian pubs and churches), Jockey's Fields (and the surrounding lawyer's chambers), Lincoln's Inn Fields, The Post Office Museum and Barnard's Park, before arriving at our final location. We even passed a fellow Goodgymmer on route- Thank you to Martin from GG Luton for saying Hi!

We re-grouped by the communal gardening shed in the centre of Thornhill Square Gardens, and gathered up all of the tools required for a variety of tasks - wheelbarrows, rakes, spades, shovels, brushes, saws and loads of green waste bags. Our first objective was to shovel piles of wood chip into wheelbarrows, and then to transport and spread the load evenly across the many flower beds within the park. Group 2 helped out by picking up rakes, brushes and leaf collecting devices to gather up as much foliage as possible from the pathways surrounding the park. We were looking for the leaves of horse chestnut trees in particular, as leaf mining moth larvae tend to use these fallen leaves as a habitat throughout the Winter. These particular bugs are known damage trees, so we want to avoid this situation as best as possible, while keeping the park tidy! Finally, group 3 had great fun searching and picking up sticks, fallen branches and logs from around the gardens (especially after the strong winds last week). Together, they sawed down the wood to smaller bundles, ready to be used for dead hedging (lining flower beds and spots where bulbs are to be planted in the new year) or for protecting saplings around the green space.

Between all of the groups, we achieved a huge amount of progress within an hour of lifting, shifting, raking and sawing. We actually ran out of green waste bags at exactly the right time! Before dropping off all of our tools back in the shed, Chalomi, Ivo, Ed and Ged wheelbarrowed three large bags of collected leaves outside the house of one of our regular task coordinators at Thornhill Square Gardens, ready for a council pick up tomorrow morning.

Congratulations on an excellent morning of green space maintenence, everyone! Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all!