In February, Ealing foodbank provided 3 days of food to over 4000 clients, so our donations this month will go towards topping their shelves back up, so they can continue to provide support to the community

What a night! There was a lot happening in Hanwell at 18:45 this Saturday. Milly, Mike and Jenni met our task owner June at the William Hobbayne Centre to pick up a few wheelbarows while Kash waited in front of the William Hobbayne Community Gardens. She was about to meet Stuart, also from the William Hobbayne charity, to get access to the gardens. Stuart arrived with his daughter Isabel and opened the gate. At the same time more GoodGymers started arriving. Raj was one of them but he just got injured on his solo run to the task. As much as he was keen to help the Hobbayne charity, he had to admit injuries are better when treated right away. June helped him get home while Madhan, Sevan and Kash waited for the rest of the crew.

As we entered the community gardens, our first sight was a big pile of soil with a HANDS OFF! sign. It was a precious high quality soil that was delivered a couple of weeks ago to the charity as a replacement for the faulty soil that had been sent to the charity before. The new soil was to be transferred into three beds that would enable children to learn about growing vegtables. Yes, those were the same beds Harvey cut the ribbon for at the grand opening in September last year.

We started the shovel, wheelbarrow and rake work under the watchful eye of our supervisor, Isabel, a representative of children who would be using the beds. She stood at the raised bed and assessed whether we distributed the soil evenly. We came up with an efficient system, and eliminated the dodgy wheelbarrow with a flat tyre from our process. Chris, who arrived a bit later, wasn't aware of why one barrow had been put aside, and continued to struggle driving it until someone told him that there are better vehicles out there.

It didn't take too long to fill the furthest bed to the top, so we moved onto the next one. It took us less than an hour to put the soil into two of the beds. Time was up and we felt pretty knackered after that intense upper body workout, so we decided to call it a day. Isabel confirmed we did a good job (phew!), so we didn't feel bad about not filling the third bed. We headed out to a nearby pub with June, Stuart and Isabel to plan the next great endeavour featuring GoodGym x William Hobbayne charity.

Bethan was alone in the TRAID Shepherd’s Bush. That didn’t matter. She was happy to get her good deeds in solo or with a gang. Luckily for her, as she started to take dresses and lengha tops from their rails, she realised she had some friends to hang out with!

Opening the door she was greeted by Lucy and Emily who had arrived on bike from the Hammersmith store for part one of the TRAID double whammy tonight. Door locked, the girls got involved with clearing the racks… and then Bethan had to answer the door again. Here was Harvey, fresh from his run. And just as Bethan locked the door and went back to her good deed, the rest of the group arrived - Analiese, Divya and Jenni!

Nicely warmed up from the task just moments before at the Hammersmith branch, we got to work quickly as helping clear all the clothes from the rails. Blouses were boxed. Polo shirts put away. T-shirts tidied up.

The favourite shoe task ended up with five of us helping out here. I don’t want to sound sexist, but all the ladies were excited about pairing shoes, whereas Divya and Harvey were quite happy on rail clearing duty!

With all the shoes paired that we could, and all the clothes off the racks, the last job was to fill one last box. Divya helped the TRAID staff to tape up one last cardboard box, and the huge pile of attire was swiftly moved into it. Many hands make light work, and we were done by 7:45! GoodGym, you guys box!

It was time for the quarterly TRAID restock, and as usual GoodGym Hammersmith and Fulham were up for the task of helping clear the hangers ready for a load of new outfits to take their place. Six of West London’s finest were here to help put, although not Area Activator Cookie - he was doing a different kind of restock and replenishing after his amazing weekend feat. For those not on the know, Cookie completed the Barcelona marathon the day before. Brilliant work, and a good excuse to miss a double good deed I suppose!

Harvey, Analiese and Divya got to work on the racks straight away, each with their own technique to get the clothes on the floor. Kudos to Divya too for being the most efficient hanger collector that TRAID Hammersmith has ever seen!

At the other end of the shop, Lucy, Emily and Jenni had taken the greatest task. You know it’s a good job when not one, not two but four people say ‘I love this task for this job’! Why it was the matching shoes game. As always, there were black boots galore. As always, there were a couple of shoes gone astray not to be found until the very last minute. As always we got several big blue bags full up of pairs of trainers and pumps and plimsolls.

Back to the shop floor, the shoe gang finished up and went to help get the last of the racks emptied and the clothes piled up into the trolleys. It was almost time, and it seemed that none of us wanted to settle for just one good deed this Monday. The final skirt hit the floor (nicely done Emily) and with a great big thank you from the Hammersmith team, the six of us head off the mile or so up the road for part two of the TRAID double whammy to Shepherds Bush!