Tonight 8 GoodGymers met at Heart and had a run for half an hour which warmed us up nicely.

We then headed back to Heart to help them out by doing a deep clean of their nursery space, cleaning the toys, chairs, removing stains on the carpet and Kat took her shoes off and cleaned the climbing frame! We also dusted the hallways and the radiators. It was our first indoor task of the autumn & it was very much appreciated!!

It was great to see Heart so busy with many groups using the centre.

It was also really nice to welcome two newcomers, Nikki & Uzair. Welcome to GoodGym Leeds guys, we hope to see you again soon.

4 of us had a good run to Hyde Park Source tonight where we litter picked around Rosebank. The whole area had so much litter, so we had our work cut out and filled a bag each. It was also great to chat to so many locals & one had been picking litter himself earlier tonight, so it was nice to know the community are doing something about the mess as well! Welcome to newcomer Naomi who has recently moved to Leeds from London. We hope to see you again soon :)

It was a lovely evening to gather in the bright, spacious atrium of the RLH this evening for our monthly visit to the hospital with the Barts Volunteers team.

Background to our task

We've been coming to the Hospital to join Nancy and the brilliant Barts Volunteers team for a while now.

For 2023, we have set up monthly visits to the hospital, in which our tasks have focused on two areas: making up activity packs and menu cards for the Patient and Family Contact Centre, and visiting the wards to gather essential feedback from patients and families.

Tonight’s teams were divided into three: one remained in the Atrium, under the careful eye of Nancy, to make up activity packs, while a further two teams headed upstairs with Richard and Tom to visit the wards, gathering vital feedback and distributing newspapers to patients.

The activity pack team worked at a fantastic pace, buoyed on by Nancy’s film quiz (“guess the artist and film to this song”) and a few tasty Lindt.

The ward teams also worked at a fast pace, engaging in many useful and meaningful conversations with patients of all ages.

Essential survey feedback was gathered, which helps the Trust in delivering effective, current, care and treatment while copies of evening London newspapers were distributed to patients, always a much-appreciated, well received bit of reading by all accounts .

Finishing at varying times gave us an opportunity to enjoy a catch-up with one another, and with the Barts Volunteers team, finding out more about what we will be involved with in the months ahead.

At just gone 8:15, we were deciding where and how to pose for this week’s group shot, headed up by Ritchie!

A huge team effort tonight! Special shout-outs to:

• Abie, whose first GoodGym event it was. Great to see you Abie, and hope to see you again soon!

• Abie and Alice who came up with tonight's pun.

• And Olivia, who reached her 100th good deed at tonight’s task (Olivia reached her 50th good deed at this same task at the end of October!). Congratulations Olivia!

Another brilliant Monday evening with the team!

Next week, we head to a brand new task in Columbia Road, to join some great gardening activity!

Until then.