Tired of fame, he joined a smaller GoodGym group for a full-body workout with zero equipment (well, apart from the picnic bemches!). Could Santa do jumping jacks and Bulgarian split squats? Yes, he could! At the end of the 15-minute session, Santa amd his two helpers were warmed-up and ready to go for all the high-fives, cheering and tail-walking at junior parkrun. Well done, Santa!

Ms K was happy to see Team Sevan & Kash again, after a while. The lady had known the two as experts in tech support and decluttering. But would she entrust them with building flatpack furniture? She had to, as three or four different IKEA units had been delivered to her flat, all mixed together. And they were not small pieces to assemble as a single person.

The priority over the bed and a pair of bedside tables was a double wardrobe - in fact, two double wardrobes! To add to the confusion, both wardrobes were custom designs, each with a different setup inside.

Sevan and Kash started by building the outer wardrobe case. They spent most of their time figuring out which of the countless pre-drilled holes were meant for the fixings. Eventually, the box came together nicely, with minimal screws adjustments, just in time, after Ms K printed the custom design instructions for the shelving, after battling with IKEA customer support for almost an hour.

Knowing they wouldn’t complete the job, but determined to give Ms K at least a minimum space to start putting the clothes away, Team S&K spent extra time at the task to install shelves and a hanging rail in the unit they’d built. The inside of the wardrobe was functional. Sadly, the GoodGymer had to leave assembling the door for another occasion - hopefully, GoodGym would be able to finish the wardrobes before Christmas or at least before the New Year.

Ms C had asked GoodGym for help weeding her garden, which didn't look too bad after another volunteer had visited recently. There were still lots of small bits to do in the gravel and cracks between the paving to keep Kash & Sevan busy. It sounded too easy though, so Ms C added another task, looking after her rose bushes.

One of Ms C's rose bushes was too large, growing over the fence and drooping over onto the pavement behind. Another she had concerns about after some feedback.

"I was told the small rose bush is dead. Is it?" - Ms C
"No, it has green leaves. It's alive." - Kash
"It only ever has 1 flower" - Ms C
"You can adjust your expectations of it"
"Have small expectations and you'll be happy" - Sevan

Ms C agreed and the small rose bush was saved. The larger rose had a large trim coming as Ms C produced some secateurs, a large saw and a step ladder. Kash started trimming the thinner branches with the secateurs while Sevan pulled weeds.

Half way through, there was a switch of roles and Sevan climbed the ladder with the saw, lopping off the thicker branches and Kash chopped the cuttings into black bag sized pieces. Ms C had some really good bags, emblazoned with "The Beast" and they did have beastly strength as the thorns from the rose didn't make a hole in the plastic.

A task that seemed small at first ended up taking the full 90 minutes. It left Ms C happy with her back garden and maybe looking forward to that single flower to bloom on the smallest rose bush.

The legend has it that deep in the ancient woodlands of Grove Farm, there was a hundred-year-old manhole covering a portal to another dimension.

Five GoodGym daredevils walked, ran and cycled to join Mike the Explorer on his mission to uncover the gate to the multiverse. The quest brought the only survivors of Mike's last month's manhole expedition: Sevan and Kash, as well as couch surfers (but not as you imagine them!), Steph Ducat and James, and a guest from another universe (GoodGym Wandsworth), Kamil.

The team used the cryptic what3words clue that.amuse.adults and a magic staff they hadn't been able to use previously - it looked like a metal detector! Mike demonstrated what the contraption does when it gets in proximity of a wormhole to a different dimension.

Aaa-aah

We heard a cry, which we couldn't tell whether it came from a human, an animal or something entirely out of this world. We had never encountered such a demonic voice.

Did a girl shout?
Was it a cat?

In fact, it was the staff channelling the sounds from the other universe! None of the heroes felt brave enough to wield such a haunted item. Eventually, Sevan, who probably resembled a wizard the most, was tasked with sweeping the staff over the ground to make it shout:

Aaa-aah!

Mike brought another enchanted weapon with him: The Hedge Equaliser, also known as The Brambles' Bane. That was Kash's favourite tool of destruction, and she only dropped it when faced with an even more powerful artefact: The Black Circle. Others might have been fooled and thought it was just a fly-tipped tyre, but the adventurers knew better. The circle must be destroyed (or at least recycled). One does not simply walk into Mordor with a huge ring of rubber - but one can roll it to the border of Grove Farm! Kash volunteered to do so, and probably for the best, as James picked up her sword and did a far better job pushing back a horde of brambles.

In the meantime, once in a while, the explorers kept hearing:

Aaa-aah!

Mike and Sevan dug out some 20th-century treasures from places hinted at by the magic staff, but none of the artefacts resembled a door obscuring an interdimensional portal.

Feeling that the quest to find a manhole was not succeeding, Mike decided on plan B, which involved simply digging a wormhole in a location associated with a primal power source: near the water. Kamil and Steph, with skill and power, quickly created a man-made hole with earthworms inside. A manhole and a wormhole in one? That would do, Mike thought, and, together with the team, planted a legendary tree in the hole: the black poplar.

In case you didn't know, black poplars are very rare, especially the female trees. Mike wanted to restore balance in Grove Farm by closing the gender gap within the tree population. Once the new female black poplar roots itself into the wormhole, it will become a guardian of the multiverse, and GoodGymers will be able to jump to different worlds to do more good - or wreak chaos, perhaps? Time will tell.

We will be back to the magical Grove Farm for more adventures next year, so make sure to join us!

Mr G was worried: his firestick has not been working properly and he feared that he wouldn't be able to stream his favourite channels over Christmas. Solving this technical challenge brought together two of his most regular GoodGym visitors: Alan joined Kash who was fresh from fulfilling Mr G's regular weekly shopping mission straight beforehand.

After a quick chat with Mr G, the pair inspected his TV setup and checked all of the cable connections. A little bit of wiggling to make sure the firestick rested more securely in its socket seemed to do the trick, and Mr G was delighted that his streaming setup now worked perfectly with the desired remote control from his tablet devices.

That quick solution gave the GoodGymers time to start investigating another issue: Mr G's non-functioning doorbell. A dead battery was diagnosed as the culprit and after a little bit of fiddling to remove the doorbell cover, they were able to take out the old battery so that Mr G knows what replacement to buy.