Eleven goodgymers descended on the Comboni Project on a bright Wednesday evening. The sisters greeted us like old friends and ran through the tasks they were keen to get our help with.

They were especially keen to enlist the help of "two strong men" and within a matter of seconds of arriving, Gus and Steph were led inside and taken to the prayer room. What happened there nobody knows, we are nun the wiser.

According to Steph they went to the 1st floor of the building to make space for a cupboard. Then moved the cupboard from a room on the top floor, through a small landing space down the winding stairs to the room where they had made space. Then moved the furniture back again. If you managed to follow that you're doing better than me...

Eventually the dynamic duo returned to the rest of the group, who by then were on a mission of their own, trying to clear endless weeds from the front and back garden.

Alanna and Jon, were working on the front garden clearing weeds and cutting back herbs. While the rest of us were set to work in the back garden clearing the lawn and two borders.

The sisters worked with us and we managed to fill three bags. Nun too shabby!

We'll be back to continue clearing the lawn and helping the sisters keep on top of the garden very soon.

Today’s mission to help Mr J and Mrs M came at just the right time, on a warm sunny afternoon, my eyes were going squiffy from so much screen time.

Mr J greeted me as I arrived and showed me inside to meet his wife M. They are the loveliest people, and so grateful for help with their beloved garden, as both are suffering with mobility issues and sadly, their daughter is also very poorly. Mr J showed me around the garden, which has two fantastic olive trees, a fig tree and a lemon tree, aswell as lots of plants and shrubs. The couple love to look out on the garden or sit out in it when they can, and were really pleased to have help with clearing the borders and potting plants and vegetables, and re-potting a couple of trees.

This was one of the nicest missions I’ve done with Goodgym, chatting with them both and seeing how happy it made them to do small jobs in their garden that had been bothering them for some time.

It was so good in fact I forgot to take any photos.

Mr J would be so grateful of more help on a weekday in the next few weeks if you are free to do a mission and can spare an hour, it will make them very happy.

Wood You Believe It? A Busy Evening at Strand on the Green! 🌳🪚🎨

What a fantastic evening we had last night at Strand on the Green School, where our mission was to protect some of the school’s outdoor wooden structures with a fresh coat of wood preserver and to tame the overgrowth that had taken over parts of the car park!

We kicked things off with a warm welcome to Sara ** – benvenuta! 🌟 So lovely to have you join us for your very first GoodGym session – we hope it’s the first of many.

There was plenty to cheer about before we got stuck in: 👏 Steph completed an ultra at the weekend – massive congratulations! 💪 And Eloise is gearing up for a half iron(wo)man this coming weekend – sending all the luck and power your way!

Armed with brushes, gloves, and secateurs, we split into teams and got straight to work. One group got busy painting and preserving the wooden structures, while the other tackled the overgrown bushes that were creeping into the car park. The transformation was impressive – big impact in a short time!

Once the task was complete, we rounded off the evening with a fitness session in the school grounds. It was a spicy mix of cardio and conditioning, with Emily, our reigning Queen of Planks, showing us all how it’s done! 🏋️‍♀️🔥

Looking ahead, we’ve got a fun mission coming up – we’ll be helping to marshal for the West London Queer Project’s 10km charity walk. It promises to be a joyous event.

Thanks to everyone who came along. Next week, Michelle will be leading the group at the Comboni Centre for some peaceful and mindful gardening. Don’t miss it!

After a morning session with Kash and Sevan in Greenford(Ealing), I ran roughly 6km downhill to Hounslow in a mixture of sun, wind and rain to Mrs E. Mrs E husband opened the side door to lead me into the back garden which was full of lovely colorful flowers. the garden was very tidy, but the couple needed help to clear weed/grass around the flowers and the trees. Also needed to trim some of the plants and trees as overgrowing. They had all the tools and some string. Why would you need some string? Simples! The beautiful fig tree needed some help with the dangling branches above the pots : Mrs E asked if i could attached the low branches so that they don't fall on the pots. Attached the branches and cleared all the weed, grass and dead wood from the area. Removed grass and weed from the slabs and trimmed the tree near the back by the lavender section : busy bee! A bee stayed on my gloves for a while until I was able to get it go to the flowers. Then I noticed that the gutter of the shed was not fitted properly which meant the water would not flow down the pipe. No strings needed for this : went up and refitted the gutter properly into the pipes so that water could flow normally especially that we had some typical English weather today with some rain. Both Mrs E and her husband were outside giving a hand to keep themselves busy and having some company as the sun was out for a bit. After a bag filled full of unwanted greenery , it was time to say "au revoir" and see you maybe next time as Mrs E asked if we could organise a mission to paint the wooden fence on the side - reported back to head office as would be lovely to help this lovely and friendly couple.

Shopping for Mr K, this time featuring microwave meals.

For the second week in a row, we had the pleasure of celebrating a GoodGym birthday – this time, a very happy birthday to Florian! 🥳

We've started a new tradition where the birthday person gets to choose the fitness session – so what did Florian go for? Legs? Arms? Conditioning? Nothing at all? You'll have to read on...

We enjoyed the beautiful early summer's evening as we headed down to the drawdock, where our job for the evening was to clear the area of the plastic and other rubbish that pollutes our waterways. These riverbanks can collect all sorts of debris, and cleaning them is crucial – it protects local wildlife, improves the water quality, and helps keep our city clean.

Armed with litter pickers courtesy of Active 360, we got to work – and it wasn’t long before the weird and not-so-wonderful bits and pieces started turning up. Amid the usual suspects (bottles, wrappers, and mystery items), we found a surprising number of old metal pieces. Chris – clearly the group's secret scaffolding expert – identified them as scaffolding fittings. But how they ended up in the river is anybody's guess.

We divided everything we found into recycling and non reclyclables and filled several bags with rubbish. Great work, team.

Then it was time to find out Florian’s birthday fitness choice... and the decision was... Tabata!

Three tough 2-minute rounds of high-intensity exercises, with 20 seconds of effort and 10 seconds of rest – we did half burpees, sumo squats, power lunges and more. Not even the stunning river views could distract us from the burn. But as always, we powered through it together.

After a run back to base and some much-needed stretches, the birthday evening was celebrated in the best possible way: at the pub, with Florian’s amazing air fryer cake.

Looking for a weekend challenge? We’ve got a massive session coming up this Saturday in Battersea and we need all the help we can get. It’s going to be a great task, followed by a well-deserved social – the perfect post-parkrun, pre weekend activity!