As Kash and Sevan removed their shoes, Ms L told them to keep them on as her cats might have left "presents" on the floor. The pair wondered how bad it could be? They'd surely be able to see and dodge any landmines. It made sense for Ms L to give the warning though as she was visually impaired. That's why she'd asked GoodGym to help her sort and pack her belongings ahead of an upcoming home move.

Everything looked well prepared with Ms L's belongings in bags and boxes. This apparent readiness to move hid a lot of work as Ms L had only been able to group together similar types of items, like clothes. The GoodGymers were needed to help identify what each specific item was, for example describing the type, pattern or brand of a piece of clothing to categorise it and help Ms L decide if she wanted to keep in. There were also vintage clothing items in Ms L's collection that she wanted to sell rather than donate as part of downsizing and decluttering.

Ms L's 3 long haired 😺😼😸 also had a keen interest in what was each bag, so Ms L, Kash and Sevan had to keep shooing them away to not get their gorgeous fur on everything. The cats were particularly keen on vintage clothes and jewellery and, as 2 of them were named after glamorous 1960's models, that made total sense. Eventually, the containers with clothes in them were sealed up to keep them safe from the fur and the claws.

Of less interest to the furry friends (the cats, not Kash and Sevan) was a lot of photography equipment that Sevan described to Ms L, some books and some gruesome looking figurines with skeletal faces and parts of their skulls missing. Only later did the pair figure out that they were a scary set of chess pieces!

As it turned out, there wasn't anything on the floor to put the GoodGymers' socks in danger and all the cats, apart from being a bit mischievous, were well behaved and very loveable. It was hard to leave the cats at the end of the mission, but some donations were ready to drop off at a local charity shop. A return visit may have to be arranged to get some more kitty time 😻.

Ms G was a keen gardener, constantly looking for ways to improve her skills, taking gardening and art courses to make her backyard look stunning. Unfortunately, the soil in her garden wasn't great. The easiest alternative was to invest in potted plants.

When Sevan and Kash entered Ms G's kitchen, they had a feeling as if they were visiting a greenhouse in Kew Gardens, although they were in Stoke Newington. The kitchen was full of baby aloe vera plants. There were also some unusual specimens like the leaf of life from Jamaica. All that greenery was staying indoors for the winter, but the plants started to outgrow their small pots and needed to be moved outside for repotting.

Sevan and Kash descended to the back garden through steep, spiral stairs, carrying small pots with plants, and found four large pots and copious amounts of soil downstairs. Together with Ms G, they quickly transferred the aloe vera and the leaf of life to the large pots, then carried them back to Ms G's own "Temperate House". Having extra time, they did some speed weeding and sweeping of the paved area in the back garden.

Ms G was grateful for the help and shared with the GoodGymers that she'd been thinking about a larger-scale project than her plant pots: raised beds. Sevan and Kash didn't know whether building raised beds could become a GoodGym mission, but if it did, it would have been an epic one!

A super easy milk & smoothie delivery from Sainsbury's to Mr R left me hungry for more challenges. When chatting to Mr R, I found out about a mysterious issue with his phone, which the local phone store wasn't able to help with. Mr R said he was unable to access some websites, especially those advertised on YouTube. After a quick look at his phone, the verdict was that his browser was perfectly fine loading websites such as GoodGym's, or even commercial ones, if accessed directly, but refused to display the pages trying to sell Mr R all sorts of stuff or hook him into playing online games. I confirmed Mr R's suspicion that his browser seemed to be protecting him from aggressive advertisement trying to prey on his attention, and we both concluded it's probably best to leave the "issue" unresolved, since Mr R could still access Amazon for deliveries, YouTube for learning new things and some fun, and other websites he really needed.

Donna Kashot of Ealing was a knight errant who had run out of adventures in her hometown. It shouldn’t come as a surprise - it was Boxing Day and all the dragons and giants preferred to stay home to feast on leftover turkey and Christmas pudding. Disappointed by the lack of opportunities for chivalric exploits in Ealing, Donna Kashot decided to venture to Westminster. She learned about a lady in distress, Mrs A, besieged in a tower, without a food supply.

On Boxing Day morning, Donna Kashot sent a dove with a message to Mrs A, to find out where to find food for Mrs A. Aldi was the response. But all-the-Aldis were closed on the day! What bad luck for adventures! A couple of dove exchanges later, the knight and the lady decided that Donna Kashot would set off for the adventure the following day after her two quests in Stoke Newington. So be it!

The following day, Donna Kashot, after defeating man-eating plants, then conquering an army of undead and breaking from the charm of three fluffy, giant beasts, ran 9km South from Hackney to the Westminster area. If you want to know why she hasn't ridden her warhorse instead, the poor thing had been eaten earlier by a man-eating plant that wasn't paying attention to how many legs the devoured creature had!

It already seemed like a pretty heroic day, but the knight’s word had to be kept, and the food had to be delivered. After navigating the crowded Camden Lock Market and the closed parts of the towpath, Donna Kashot finally reached Aldi and found out the rye sourdough bread was sold out. With the rest of the food in her bag, Donna Kashot went to a Middle Eastern store to buy flatbread instead and a kilo of yogurt. Now was the time to head to Mrs A’s confinement in the tower. But when the knight errant arrived at the castle, the light was off, and no one responded to the knocking.

Donna Kashot sent her trusted dove on a search for the missing lady, and the bird brought back a shocking message:

Your princess is in another castle!

The knight learned that Mrs A, together with her sister, was now in a totally different place! Undeterred by such minor obstacles (excited by the challenge, actually!), Donna Kashot walked through the dark streets, full of ghouls and ghosts, and finally discovered the safe place, where Mrs A and her sister hid from the danger.

Having fulfilled her overdue chivalric deed, Donna Kashot wished the sisters a happy New Year and ran to Paddington to descend into the underground for more adventures to come.

A perfect Christmas Eve task cannot get better than what five eager GoodGymers did at a secret location in Ealing this year! Wrapping presents, peeling veggies for a Christmas meal, and prepping non-alcoholic Grinch mojito - all of that for the next day’s Christmas Dinner for young care leavers, who would otherwise be alone this season.

Most of the GoodGymers were on the kitchen duty: Harvey and Maria got stuck into spud-bashing, exchanging insights about parkrun and festivals. Seema peeled so many carrots that she would remember them until Christmas 2026. Kash, after wiping hundreds of plates, was removing the outer leaves of Brussels sprouts and carving the sign of the cross at their base. Why? Apparently, it makes them cook faster!

Meanwhile, Sevan creatively packed presents for care leavers, then left with the organiser, Pam, for a quest to deliver delicious coffee for all the volunteers.

For many young care leavers, Christmas can be a reminder of what they don’t have. That’s why it felt so rewarding to help a small team of volunteers create a day that makes those vulnerable young people feel not alone and that they have a community around them. We hope this year’s Ealing Christmas Dinner event will be delightful!

Behind Mrs M's house lay a jungle filled with trees, vines, spiky branches and all sorts of other things. Mrs M wanted the trees in her jungle to produce fruit again, so GoodGym sent Mr and Ms Tarzan to help her out.

The trees that Mrs M wanted to get producing fruit again were in the middle of the jungle and had become overgrown with ivy and brambles. So much so that the bark of the trees could barely be seen in places. The Tarzans, ducked, dived and swung their ways through creepers and climbers to arrive at the fruitless apple trees. Clearing the ivy was key to the trees' future health as the GoodGym pair had learned at an earlier group session this year.

After the effort of making their way to the trees, the Tarzans took a look at the tools that Mrs M had given them and found 1 sharp and 1 blunt pair of secateurs, a blunt pair of shears and a garden fork. With few useful tools, they'd have to use their brains... or as it turned out, their strength to free the trees. After using the secateurs to cut the low level thinner vines, they took separate paths. Mr Tarzan went low to prise the thick vines close to the ground away from the tree bark, then break them to kill the ivy far above his head. Ms Tarzan swung and climbed high into the canopy to clear as many vines as possible from the tree bark.

With pulling, prising, twisting and snapping, the Tarzans managed to clear all of the vines from the 2 tree trunks that were within reach. With nothing left to swing with, the pair walked to the edge of the jungle to tell Mrs M of their successes. Mrs M was hopeful that with the GoodGymers' help, she would have a better crop of apples next year.

Ah, the dark Walpole Park in winter, a fleet of wheelbarrows, and the usual suspects with head torches, shovels, spades and rakes. Sounds familiar? Another trip to the Walled Garden, a path surface that needed refreshing and the scent of... woodchip? Or maybe something else?

Tonight's task was the second part of the 2025 edition of replacing woodchip on the Walled Garden path, so we've been doing a fair amount of digging, wheelbarrow runs, shovelling, and raking. Certainly not weeding, which in turn was the speciality of other visitors to the park garden - a different kind of weeding.

When walking with wheelbarrows past Rickyard, each time we heard party tunes. Did the Christmas miracle come early, transforming Walpole Park into a nightclub? Everyone seemed to be having fun - and so did we! With a small, but powerful team of four: Harvey, Steph, Sevan and Kash, we've finished off the job in no time! Now we're getting ready for the start of 2026, kicking off the group runs with another session at Walpole Park - sign up now!