Shout-out to Peter for the egg-cellent pun!

We were back at the AMC Gardens last night for an evening of tussling with weeds, compost and some rather worse-for-wear wood.

All six of us arrived under our own steam, with a trio running from town, two on bikes and a solo runner! Great work, team!

After a tour for those of us who hadn't been to the Gardens before, we got stuck into shifting compost from the main bins to some tarps as Katie and the team felt the bins had seen better days and needed reconstructing. Nigel, Aj, Peter and Leah got stuck in with spades, pitchforks and wheelbarrows, managing to clear most of the ready compost and some that was still rotting down into separate piles. Their work clearly had an impact on the local wildlife, with the chickens inspecting every barrow-load for tasty treats and a rogue frog scaring the bejeesus out of Leah (stronger language may have been used, but this is a family website). Katie thankfully moved it out to the pond area for a good drink and a splash. Finally, Leah and Peter began the process of dismantling the old bins, ripping out the old liners and some of the wood.

Meanwhile, Bozena and Tom were over in the gardens proper clearing out some of the beds to make space for planting. The proceeds were then donated to the compost piles the rest had been creating.

We finished our evening with some delicious freshly picked apricots and some well-earned water. What a way to spend a lovely balmy evening!

We were back at the AMC Gardens this week to continue our previous efforts to rid the kids' play area of brambles.

A small but mighty team of Bozena, Adrian and Leah got stuck right in (sometimes literally with those grippy little barbs), chopping out the bulk then digging up the roots.

Despite Leah's overly enthusiastic chopping breaking the handle of a pair of loppers, we managed to move seven wheelbarrow loads of these thorny customers over to the compost heap to rot down a bit before burning.

We're looking into organising some more sessions here in the near future, so keep your eyes on the WhatsApp and here!

Summer felt like it had arrived as Leah, Rob and Rachel headed to the Arkwright Meadows Community Garden (accompanied by a couple of mini GoodGymers once again). This was our first visit to this community green space, hidden away in the Meadows area of Nottingham, and we were absolutely amazed to see everything that was going on in the garden.

We met some of the regular volunteers and trustees on arrival, and were given a tour of the vast site. We then gathered some tools and set to work on our task - clearing an area of brambles near the family play section so that the space can be used by the children without fear of getting spiked! We needed to dig up the brambles from the root which, whilst very satisfying, proved a rather hot and sweaty task in the sun. We worked for around 90-minutes and managed to make a pretty good dent in the overgrowth.

Hopefully we may be able to return in the near future to finish the job and/or help with some of the other projects going on within the AMC garden.