On a beautifully sunny Saturday, Goodgym-ers from Lambeth and Wandsworth joined forces to help the team at the Community Healing Gardens in Vauxhall. It was especially good to welcome Amy to her first ever Goodgym session!

The Community Healing Gardens is a gorgeous green haven in the middle of an otherwise built-up area, which provides residents with essential outdoor space, and a habitat for birds and other wildlife. The volunteer team have recently planted mixed native hedge whips around the perimeter of the garden and our mission today was to give these freshly planted areas a bit of TLC to encourage growth.

We were given a warm welcome from Head Gardener Hugh, and then joined local residents Hannah, Nehal and Stella, as well as Gareth from Friends of the Earth Lambeth, to tackle the tasks…

🌿 Ben and Michael filled a huge planter with soil

🌱 Tracey and Katie weeded the beds where the new hedges had recently been planted

🍃 Amy filled in potholes in the lawn and collected litter

Once those jobs were completed, we all took it in turns to fill wheelbarrows with mulch to put down in the freshly weeded beds to discourage weeds.

As if by magic, two flasks of tea and a Victoria sponge cake appeared just at the perfect moment for a well-earned break!

We all agreed that many hands make light work, and that we like the Healing Gardens very mulch - hopefully we’ll be back soon!

2 GG-ers,Tracey and Chandrima, headed to Camberwell Green to support Barbara from the SE5 Forum committee, who runs a regular Saturday market stall but is currently suffering from bronchitis that hinders her ability to set up.

🛒 💪🏻Tracey helped tow the heavy trolleys from the leisure centre to the green, before she and Chandrima set up the gazebo, arranged the tables, set up the t-shirt cloth hanger, and laid out all the merchandise including mugs, tote bags, fridge magnets, hats, books, postcards, and key rings. Chandrima put up the bunting, and Tracey made sure the display looked as fabulous as the sun shining all over London today. ✨☀️

We spent a lovely morning getting into the Christmas spirit at St Saviour's! There was a lot to do to turn the church into a winter wonderland fit for their carol service but we set to work to pull off a Christmas miracle. Our group of elves set up (and untangled!) six sets of hanging lights, swept up eleven bags of leaves from outside, sorted and decorated two Christmas trees and made sure every surface was looking fabulous with cloths, nets and candles galore. Special shout out to Letizia who took on the task of brightening up the scaffolding and to Jordan and Felix for patiently stringing five hundred lights back and forth.

It will be a wonderful event for the community and will hopefully get everyone feeling festive. It was great to welcome Tom to his first festive group task and to see everyone else ahead of our last task of the year on Monday winding up another fantastic year of doing so much good!