What a wonderful task organised by Julie, who kindly provided all the paint, paintbrushes, pots, tablecloths and even drinks and snacks.

It proved to be a popular task as there was a good turn out from the Woking GoodGym gang to paint bird boxes for Knaphill Lower School. We were given a wooden bird box to unleash our creative painting talents. Becky and Anne shared a box, and went with a very practical camouflage design, as did Julie and Kirsty who went with a beautiful shade of blue plus a cheerful yellow sun.

Nadia did GoodGym proud by not only painting a colourful box but also bringing along a friend for January in the form of her mum who is a good painter as demonstrated by her berry design. Adam ran to the task now he is getting back into running in time to paint a colourful red and blue box.

Ola showed his creative talent by using masking tape for his design. Vicky from the PTA popped along to see our hard work and explained 20 bird boxes will be placed along a trail for the lower school children to try to spot them all.

Vicky's son picked Stephanie's as the the best painted bird box, which was well deserved, as she was able to combine a practical but stylish design of green leaves.

A fun afternoon at Andy's Cafe with WEAct. There were plenty of board games to pick from. I had a good game of Rummikub, a classic Bananagram and then tried a new game using the Banagram tiles. It was great meeting new people and there were some fantastic veggie and vegan cakes to keep energy levels up. If the session is repeated I'd say it was well worth joining.

Luan, Olalekan, Kirsty and Julie were back for another session reviving the outdoor space for the school pupils. Vikki had 2 jobs for us this week - creating a habitat hedge and constructing a gate. Ola took on the gate and persevered all session, showing great determination,overcoming incorrect instructions and a lack of pre-drilled holes to create a great looking finished product!

Luan teamed up wiith one of the school parents and did a great job of removing the ivy, while Kirsty demonstrated her fantastic new tools that Father Christmas had provided. She must have been on the 'very nice' list. The loppers were particularly great for chopping the branches for the habitat hedge and the hori hori (a cross between a trowel and a knife) was great for making holes for the support posts. A great job by the team as always.

Looking forward to meeting at the Phoenix Cultural Centre on Wednesday evening to paint the nesting boxes.

Rebecca, Anne andAlys took part in the awesome annual Doughnut Dash organised by Phoenix Running Club.

It involves 5.3k out and back laps along the river Thames and at the end of each lap you get a doughnut! The event is informal and friendly and participants can start when they want between 7am and 8.30am and finish when they want before 3pm.

Becky started just after 7am with the first lap in the dark but the opportunity to see a lovely sunrise.

After a brief break to take her nephews to the playground to let her sister run, she clocked up 4 laps (21k). Anne did a superb job and clocked up 15k over 3 laps. and Alys smashed through 2 laps.

We all enjoyed our doughnuts and giant doughnut shaped medals, which to be honest were the two main reasons we were there running up and down the Thames in freezing cold January weather.

*Junior Park Run *

This mornings junior park run was the 1st of 2026 🏃‍♂️ and what a great turn out it was despite the cold weather.

Wayne arrived first after doing his normal Sunday 10k run followed by Adam & James.

The boys were out on the 2k course cheering the young runners around. In total there were 117 runners who took part with the fastest time being a fantastic 07:47 😀. There were also 17 PB's great running by everyone.

*Xmas Junior Park Run *

This morning 5 GG members turned up at a very festive junior park run 🎄

Wayne arrived early straight from his 8k run wearing his festive hat that was given by Kirsty last year ❤️. The bandstand looked amazing with all sorts of festive decorations. Shortly after Karen arrived wearing her Xmas hat James arrived after with Rich straight from their 11k morning run along the canal they were dressed in festive mud all over their legs 🤣 Melanie then arrived wearing some very festive leggings Alys arrived last with her festive tutu and she also had a spare one which Melanie put on 🎅 All the runners really made an effort today we had running Turkeys to running Santa's everyone looked great 😀

In total we had 140 runners with the fastest time an impressive 07:34 with 56 PB's great running by everyone.

Hope you all have a fantastic Xmas and hope to see you soon ❤