On this month's GoodGym Food bank flash mob we:

• Shifted all the crates of fresh vegetables in the kitchen to sweep and mop the floor
  
• Cleaned all the fridges
  
• Took out the food waste for collection tomorrow
  
• Did an inventory of the medicines
  
• Portioned up tea bags and nappies (needless to say not into the same parcels!)
  
• Cleaned mucky food crates
  
• Moved a large area of shelving, tables and stacked up food stock to thoroughly clean the area - probably for the first time since we did it last winter!
  

These maintenance and cleaning tasks are very difficult to find time for in the usual day-to-day running of the Oxford Mutual Aid food bank, and so our regular evening blitz of cleaning is very much appreciated by the food bank team. They've already expressed their appreciation for our efforts.

Orinoco is a new project for us, but in fact has been going for over 20 years. They aim to inspire art, creativity and play through reuse of items that would otherwise be destined for landfill. Previously based in Peat Moors, they now have a shiny new home in Temple Cowley shopping centre and a lot of moving-in jobs to be done.

This was our 2nd Wednesday evening session at Orinoco. The book event we helped them prepare for last week was a roaring success at the weekend, with over £900 raised in donations. Now it was time to the flip the store from book shop to multi-purpose space.

Springing into action we had teams:
* Unloading the Orinoco van to bring in more stock.
* Clipping shelving together to make taller units and reconfiguring their layout.
* Reorganising the storage area at the back of the shop floor - breaking down cardboard boxes, taking loads of donations upstairs to the extensive store rooms above the shop.
* Stocking the shelves with books to make a library corner.
* Laying out the games in another section of shelving.
* Attempting construction of further shelving; a failed attempt due to missing elements of the units - no GoodGymers at fault ;-)

By the time our hour was up the shop was looking much closer to being ready for the big relaunch on 19th February.

Great work team!