it was a return visit to the Carrington Community Garden last night in, would you believe, daylight! The council parks team had made a start earlier that day but there was still plenty to do
Guided by councillor Nayab (thank you for the snacks!) and Mark (ably assisted by Jack the dog) Nigel, Natalie, Florence and Peter were trying to detangle ivy from a tree. Elsewhere, Matt (now just one away from the coveted black shirt!) spent the evening attacking brambles (apart from when his extra height and agility were required!). So good to be back outdoors with no torches - here's to a long summer of GoodGym tasks

Despite the violent swings between rain and hail earlier today, somehow it wasn't Wet Wet Wet when we got to the ICCA this week. It was Cold Cold Cold though.

We picked up the kit from our hosts and headed outside to carry on where we left off a few weeks ago.

This time we gave the railings a good rub down with some sandpaper to get rid of the worst of the flaking paint before forging forward along the railings.

The light aaaalmost lasted the whole of the task, and one passerby did offer us the flash from his phone towards the end.

Fingers a little frozen, we headed inside to warm up, and got a lovely serenade from Matt on his otamatone during photo time.

You know you've got a good bunch of GoodGymers when eight of them turn up on a windy, close-to-freezing evening in February to paint railings.

After a little bit of stalling having a look round the glorious entrance area at The Atrium, we grabbed the paint and brushes and headed outside.

We decided to split into two teams of four starting at opposite ends of the first section of gates, each with two on the outside and two on the inside in an effort to make things as efficient as possible. It's going to be a massive job (we're scheduled to come back in a couple of weeks and will likely be back a few more times as we get towards the summer), but I think we made a good start! Just look at the difference in the pics.

Belated congratulations to Khiltee on her 10th task, and shoutout to Florence for hitting a fabulous 15! An additional thanks goes to Rachel who figured out that washing-up liquid is the best way to get this kind of paint off your skin!