The first group run of April also brought first really nice evening of the year weather-wise as the majority of GG Yorkies ditched the long sleeves and leggings for shorts and baseball caps. Tonight we celebrated a couple of epic recent PBs; one for Matt at the Berlin half last weekend and another for James at yesterday's tricky Helmsley 10k. Epic running chaps 💪

Tonight we also celebrated Hannah completing her 50th good deed! Although there was to be no cape tonight as she signed up too late for Ed to realise he needed to pack one. We'll get you next time!

Tonight we headed off to the Groves for some leafleting and a few odd tasks around the communal gardens. Laura set off promptly with a walking group, which was a good job as they decided to take the long way round, whilst Rich led a walk/run crew. The rest of the group set off with Ed at the front and Pete backmarking, but not before they'd had a stab at guessing the world's most popular chocolate bar (a question that proved to be a bit too much for Mitch as he struggled to muster an answer). Leanne was the only one who guessed correctly which got her out of 10 seconds of fast feet!

Over at the task 16 leafleters (not sure that's a word) paired up and set off delivering flyers for the Groves Association. The remaining team got to grips with various tasks including shifting bricks (careful), putting up some fairy lights, and a spot of composting

We all then met back up at 7:15 sharp for a quick team photo before a very appropriate fitness session from James who organised an epic sack race and even brought along some chocolate for the winning team. Cue lots of talk about James' sack for the remainder of the evening!

What better way to start the bank holiday than helping get the Acomb clothes swap ready? Ok well maybe there are a few but four of us volunteered to help anyway and had a lot of fun getting the tables out, bringing the rails up from under the stage and making sure everything looked perfect for the morning.

The easter clothes swap was very busy so luckily there were four of us this month to support the regular volunteers.

Everyone worked hard to ensure the new clothes made it out onto the rails and everything remained tidy. The task flew by and there was just time to pose with some easter eggs before we headed off to enjoy the bank holiday weekend.

A really rewarding task for Mr J who needed help and was very friendly. While sorting through boxes following a move it was a case of sorting stuff to get rid of all that stuff and paperwork that we all accumulate but is just taking up space. However, there was also stuff of value to keep and Mr J said keep or bin as we went through ! Plenty of anecdotes and even more interesting to find out he used to work with a fellow GGer…. (The clues in the title !) Look out for a duplicate task because still stuff to sort through…

Today saw a great turnout for our first non headtorch run of the year!

Today was international Victoria day but rather than base our welcome on that we shared what we would do with our bank holiday weekend.

It should really have been Leanne day as she wasn't just crowned goodgymer of the month, but also got to wear the good deed cape for doing an incredible 1300 good deeds!

We also welcomed Ellie and congratulated Nick snd Babs for being married for 35 years!

We then set off to two tasks-

At Rowntree Park we were greeted by Stu who split us into 3 teams. The first team got to grips with a load of soil that we had previously shifted from from the gardens to the back of the lodge. This time we moved it to its final location into the raised beds.

The second group tackled a load of green waste and moved it from across the park over to the table tennis area. With Max particularly enjoying taking a ride in the giant wheelbarrow

Team 3 were instructed to remove the sedge from the garden, and after a quick Google to find out what sedge is, felt competent enough to know what they were doing. However the sedge in Rowntree park was about 50 times bigger than the ones in the photos on Google! Eventually the sedges, Sedgeric and Right Sedge Fred, were moved to their new homes closer to the lake.

All 3 teams finished their jobs with enough time spare to fill a couple of barrows worth of wood chip from the wildlife area and move it to the gardens. We were briefly joined by Jackie who earned her place in the team photo by grabbing a couple of handfuls of wood chip!

The second team stopped off at Southlands church to clear a bed of everything except the Magnolia tree! We pretty much completed the task just in time for team Rowntree to collect us and head to the park for some fun fitness.

Tonight we played heads, shoulders, knees and coins and the team with the most won a creme egg. After much tackling and slightly too much violence for goodgym, it all came down to a deciding game of rock paper scissors.

We then headed back to base and a decent crew stayed on for a drink, possibly to get one of Babs brownies!

Despite the soggy start to the day we had a fantastic GoodGym turn out! Soph, Jo and Ben made very light work of the set-up and stuck around to make sure everyone felt welcomed with teas and coffees. Ben made a new friend in King the guide dog, and his owners, and the girls had such a good laugh in the kitchen that they were (very kindly) told-off by the chair yoga teacher who was trying to do a guided meditation next door!