Rake Progress

After another Bank Holiday Monday, we moved our session to Wednesday again. We headed back to English Martyrs School where we are meet the head teacher, Helen.

Thank you to my team tonight - It was great to see Ryan and Sarah after their Worthing 10k at the weekend. It was lovely to welcome back Megan after some very busy weeks of work for her. Thank you also to John and El who had both marshalled at the RUN Fest on Sunday.

Completing this evening's team was Ricky and Roxy along with puppy Mali in a cat carrier 😻😅.

Helen asked us to continue with the clearing of the large beds that we had started last week. The school are planning to plant a butterfly garden and we are more than happy to assist with this :)

Although the progress didn't look so dramatic this week we worked equally as hard. Thank goodness we had John's electric saw that he was able to cut through the stubborn tree roots. We hope we haven't broken it !

As well as the sawing there was a lot of brute digging activity going by Ryan,Ricky and Megan, together with some very fine raking by Sarah and El. Roxy was got right down to the task pulling out roots and weeding the area she was working on too. . I was in charge of getting the debris to the compost heap. With the help of John's gauntlet gloves this definitely pushed my step count up for the day!

Another very worthwhile and impactful task ! Thank you all and see you all next week.

Have a lovely weekend in the warm weather.

Julia xx

Getting to the (almost) root of the problem

On a stunning April evening we had headed across Sunny Worthing to one of more recent, but also favourite tasks, at English Martyrs school. We were met by Helen, the head teacher who had a comprehensive list of task requests. Many of us had arrived with loppers in readiness for hedge and bramble work so we got straight to work.

Special mention to Roxy who completed The London Marathon yesterday in a fantastic time. Massive congratulations also must go to Anne who completed the 50 mile South Downs Challenge a few weeks ago and returned to her GoodGym buddies tonight.

Most of the team including Belinda, Barbara,El,John,Ricky,Paul Gillybean, and Anne got stuck into lopping down large brambly hedges lining the bordering fence. They certainly worked with great gusto with lots to get done in a limited time. The progress was excellent with piles of debris soon appearing ready to be transferred to the compost heap.

Roxy and puppy Mala decided to continue painting the fence that we had started last year. With only 1 paint brush it was a 1 person job but we do hope that we will push through and finish the whole thing this summer before it will all need doing again next year! Luckily for Roxy, when Mala got a little too hot and restless Helen's daughter stepped in and was only too pleased to take her inside to play with her.

Stéphane arrived just in time to help me empty compost into the new raised beds before concentrating on helping with all the debris clearing. John had usefully brought along a brand new electric strimmer which was sliced through the brambles beautifully. Gill very usefully found a trolley to help with transportation to the compost heap ( great photo)

Superstar of the day

Talking of the strimmer ..... John unfortunately misplaced a wing nut on it so we were all trying to keep a look out for it which was a little like looking for a needle in a haystack ! However thanks to our eagle eyed ( and determined) El this was the first of two problems that we didn't need to worry about! Within the space of 10 minutes she had not only found the missing part for the strimmer but also Paul's glasses which had dropped off his head into the abysis of foliage ! El is definitely one we are keeping !

What a lovely evening this was :) We will be back again next week to continue with more jobs. As its a bank holiday Monday we will be meeting next Wednesday 7th May at 6pm instead.

Have a great BH long weekend and see you next week.

Julia x

Better than a BOGOF - Today was a triple! It was a great turn out this evening and we had a very prompt start.

Head teacher Helen asked to do 3 things

*Dig over the flower beds at the front of the school and line it with wood chips.

*Continue painting the fence surrounding the play area.

*Dig out a massive plant in the play area.

Daisy andPaul elected to get started on the digging and were joined byJohn and Duncan. Gillybean did her usual great job on pruning and tidying the bushes on the flowerbed which made a huge difference to the visual finish ( Daisy helped with this too )

Ryan, Sarah and Roxy headed out to continue where we left off last time with the painting of the fence in a forest green colour. They were joined by Sue and Belinda Everyone tried to avoid Sarah's paint flicking skills but some of us didn't manage to swerve this ' talent ' 🤣

The flowerbed team soon achieved fantastic results and came and joined the team at the back of the school. Daisy pitched in with the fence whilst John and Paul decided to attack the huge plant/ bush that needed removing in the play area.

Given the time we had left , this was an optimistic and challenging and involved a fair amount of brute force and determination plus some cardiovascular strength too ! They were joined by Duncan who brought some muscle and also Gill who offered some useful technique tips 🤣

Despite all odds the task was completed meaning we had achieved 2 / 3 of our goals tonight - Bravo team 👏

Next week we will return to continue painting the ( eternal ) fence!

The final question is, why is this report entitled ' What lies beneath ' ? There are 2 answers to this - both fairly confidential. One relates to what is underneath the wood chips and the other is what Belinda is concealing underneath her hoodie! Ssssshhhh - nobody knows 😁😁😁

Summer is finally here

With the warmest day of the year so far we all eagerly arrived in our painting gear as we had been asked to paint some fencing separating the play area from the field.

After a bit of a delayed start we were welcomed by head teacher, Helen, who showed s what needed doing. With a great 9 strong GG turnout, it was a shame that we only had 4 paint brushes provided. However we made the best of it split the task into some gardening too. Many thanks to Sarah who inspired the strap line for the report -she nicely splattered both my legs with green paint! HoweverRyan and Sarah did some quality work and the fence looked very professionally painted. At the other end of the fence Roxy and Barbara were in the shade of the trees working their magic with their painting skills whilst having a good old catch up chat!

Daisy Belinda John and Sue headed over armed with spades to finish digging over and weeding two of the raised flowerbeds that we had worked hard on during the last few visits. They achieved great results in a short and unexpected amount of time.

What a lovely evening it was ! Good luck to Barbara on her 25 km walk this Sunday :)

A storm in a tea cup

Wow the weather nearly wiped us out tonight! With torrential rain, wind and a tornado like wind just before we were due to meet , we all hunkered down in our cars or homes a little bit longer than planned.

Luckily it blew over very quickly and the sun came out so we all met a little later but the task was back on.

We were met by the Head teacher Helen who pointed us in the right direction of the pond and raised beds where we were carrying out the task of clearing the 2 remaining raised beds ( we did one of them last time ) together with some further pond maintenance carried out by our resident pond team consisting of BelindaPaulJohn and Barbara

Paul literally waded into the pond with his wellies on to remove a lot of weed whilst John assisted with his long pond tool. Paul also assisted when the end of John's tool fell off and Paul rescued it. What a hero! Barbara and Belinda was also assisting where necessary as well as pruning around the decking in preparation for the little people to investigate their natural surroundings.

Meanwhile - at the raised beds the team were tusselling with some very overgrown and neglected shrubs whose roots had grown well down into the earth below the timber construction. Ryan and Sarah braved the weather ( surprisingly brave - Sarah !! ) together with Paula Daisy and Gillybean who all worked tirelessly to try and shift the shrubs, weeds and grass all deeply embedded into the earth.

in the last 10 minutes committed members of the pond team joined to give some much needed help on a final push to clear the beds. We then returned to the pond to admire the hard work and spot the living world underneath the water.

Many apologies for the late report- blame Teddy!

Next week there will be 2 tasks - 1 in Ferring and one meeting at Splashpoint. I will share the details on what's app today.

Have a great ( rest of the week)

Julia xx

Happy 7th Birthday GoodGym Worthing

What an evening it turned out to be! Seven, yes seven years after GG arrived in Worthing and we had a brand new task tonight. We celebrated our special occasion with some Athletic Brewing AF beer ( complimentary with the GG sponsorship agreement) and Worthing Run Fest giveaways and also a very special announcement from Stephen ( but more about that later! )

We were helping out at a local first school, English Martyrs, to give some assistance with their pond and surrounding shrubs and bushes together with raised beds that needed a good weed and tidy.

We had a friendly welcome from the head teacher, Helen, who let us in and showed us what needed to be done before she dashed off for her ballet class.

Barbara, John and Belinda were the resident consultants for the pond maintenance and we were all super grateful for their knowledge and the tools they brought too. With Belinda still on light duties due to her thumb injury, Barbara and John started work on the pond whilst Belinda was in charge of the photography ( much appreciated by me ! )

Daisy, Ricky, Stephen and Gillybean did some amazing pruning on the large bushes surrounding the pond whilst Sue and I worked on digging over and weeding the raised beds outside of the pond area. Belinda also did some innovative compost heap creation then single handedly ( literally) shifted debris to the newly created site.

Back at the pond the pruning was still in full swing but with the entrance turning into a quad mire we decided to recycle some of the prunings to make a path that we could actually walk on with out slipping everywhere.

The pond clearing was also going well and with the discovery of frog spawn and newts we all took some time to take a look whilst also being careful to reunite any newts in the moss safely back to their pond home again.

The GoodGym flag made an appearance on this special day and just after the photo, Steve made his special announcement that he and fellow GoodGymer Natacha are engaged ! Wow ! Congratulations to the happy couple and another Worthing GG happy ending ( it must be the sea air! )

With happiness and good vibes flowing, and after clearing up, we cracked open some beers in celebration of everything and I off loaded some spare runfest tee shirts to anyone that would take one ( or preferably two!)

A great feel good evening with both a great task and plenty of happy banter and news to share with our fellow GG buddies.

Next week there will be two options of tasks - Bugcycle will be led by Gillybean and Beehive Care Home in Ferring led by me. Take your choice and vote with your feet!

Have a great week

Julia xx