On a lovely Tuesday evening, an Olympic inspired bunch of GoodGymmers rocked up to help with some gardens at one of our favourite venues, St John's Court.

Lining up for this race were Portsmouth GoodGym alumni and Olympic legends Katie and Tony. Previous medal winners Felicia and James had also qualified for this final, whilst new to the Olympics Evie had also made it to the final. Finally, veteran Meyrick completed the lin up.

Straight out of the blocks we were tackling the weeds in the beatifully tranquil garden area at the back of St Johns Court, right by the river. This Olympic venue is is managed accommodation for the elderly and we were also joined by Lily and Sam, residents with action and support in there hearts.

WE had a lot to do in an hour but made quick work of the two flower beds we were asked to weed, also having time to plant flowers in their place which are likely to make this a really nice gardens feature over the next few weeks.

Peripheral work was also going on as more cutting back needed doing in the general area, to help make this as tranquil and tidy an area for the residents to enjoy.

Great work by all, everyone won Gold and everyone broke World Records.

Kate and Helen made their way to St John's Court to help the residents with their garden. Armed with a few small garden implements we were tasked with digging up weeds from a flower bed.

It looked like an easy task, but Kate kept getting her hair caught in the thorns above and Helen could barely get the fork into the ground as it was so hard.

Tackling the thorny bushes above, we cleared them out of the way and most of the weeds in the bed ready for planting.
We look forward to going back again next month to help the residents.

April comes, and struggles to commit to Spring, as despite some sunny days recently the temperature has been a little on the chilly side.

In the sheltered courtyard of St John's Court however, we found ourselves in almost mild conditions as four GoodGymmers, Richard, Helen, Emily and Meyrick rocked up to help remove the Winter's weeds from the courtyard outide the dining hall.

This care/retirement home is in a lovely setting by the riverside and it's important that the residents can fully enjoy the outside areas as the weather warms up.

There were a lot of weeds though, but we are GoodGym and we made quick work of removing them with the limited tools we had at our disposal.

With a hope that Spring proper is only weeks away, let's hope the residents can enjoy this area all the better as the weather warms up.

Christmas was over in a flash. It felt like days had past since we put up the decorations but here we were posed to take them down again.

Since there were only 3 of us, we had to be speedy. We had 2 rooms, 3 Christmas trees to take down and pack away. We moved at pace, placing all decorations neatly into the numerous boxes they had come out of. We ran from room to room, squashing Christmas trees back into the boxes which seem far too small at first. But whilst two of us sat on the box, whilst the other taped it in place we managed to get them all boxed up.

Another year done and we look forward to returning in December.

GoodGym Bath made another trip to St John's court to help put up their Chrimbo deckies.

This has become an annual outing for us over the past few years, and once again we decked out 3 rooms to help brighten the place for the festive period.

In total we erected 3 Christmas trees, loads of dangly thingies, and about a million* lights. Lovely.

* actual figure may vary

Four of us arrived, four of us conquered, four of us spent much longer than anticipated to take down Christmas decorations.

You'd think that taking down decorations would be a quick job, however.... with Christmas trees, lots of ceiling tinsel with sellotape to remove and lights to pack away it certainly took us much longer than the hour planned.

This didn't worry us but did present us with a unexpected challenge. We removed the lights from two of the trees but the three tree was much more complex. With twists and turns around each and every branch it certainly took a while. Unfortunately it was only when half of the lights were removed did Helen point out that these trees come with lights already attached which didn't need removing... aaah!

But we had started, so we must finish. 45 minutes later and a tangled mess on the floor we slowly detangled the lights until ahhhahhha! It was done. Yay result. At least now this will make the job in December much easier for the next person....