4 hardy GGers braved the snow and ice traversing to the BIG skip at West Bank Park. Donned with many layers they set about climbing into the skip to dig, rake & shovel compost leftovers into bags. As we generated energy & heated up, excess clothes were discarded and those left on were coated with a lovely layer of mud in true GG style. 30 bags were filled, ready to go to our Tiny Forest. 1 hour later the skip was bare with a squeaky clean bottom. Good team work.

Another month, another booksale at the library. We enjoyed the usual task of putting out more books, taking our time to nosy around the wide range of subjects - with Leanne spotting a familiar view in a book on England's cathedrals.

We were also entrusted with picking out the least sellable books to be boxed up for salvage, leading to a discussion on what the good people of York may or may not enjoy reading (history fans should definitely get themselves down to Tang Hall for some bargains).

This one is definitely too sticky ! Ellie

Result: Everything set out for a bumper booksale and more valuable funds for Tang Hall library.

Those of us who'd done the morning's mission headed first for lunch at Hello Mallow, where baked beans are served in a glass, and Lucy discovered this does not mean they're enjoyable to chug (Down it! Down it!). After filling ourselves with a hearty farmer's brunch, we cycled along the bumpy riverbank track to our field where we met David & co, who had been working hard already since 10, and were joined by Penny and Ellie.

Half the field had already been raked into neat rows, ready for the baler to come in a few days, and our task was to finish the job. Armed with rakes and pitchforks, we split into smaller groups and advanced the rows rapidly and mostly in a straight line. Stopping only the retrieve lost tennis balls and wait for frogs to retreat. Sadly, some unforecast drizzle made the hopes of the hay drying out quickly fade, having already rescheduled this task across the entire of July!

In no time at all we were done, making neat tractor turning circles at the car end of the field, and quickly scooping up a freshly mowed section. Some of us headed off for cafe #2 while the rest of the team dispersed, another job well done.

We arrived at the task on a thankfully warm and sunny evening to find that only a small area of ground had been rotavated as the machine was not up to the task and had broken down/ran out of power after a few hours earlier in the day. Hopefully a bigger machine can be sought for next time. However, it hadn't left any huge clods of earth behind for us to break up (as originally planned) so we switched to digging up the docks - which had some very impressive roots! Laura won the prize for the largest root although there were some close contenders. We concentrated on the larger patches and ones that were setting seed. After an hour we heaped all our weeds and roots under the nearby trees and were pleased that we had helped to improve the ground a little bit more.