6 Goodgymmers armed themselves with litter pickers and headed for the gardens of the Wood Green Library to give the Library's Friends a hand clearing this very busy community space.

Silence, please

We congregated for an evening of hardcore litter picking at the Wood Green Library, expecting a bit of a mess and it didn't disappoint!

This much-loved but very busy community space acts as the de facto town square at the very busy Wood Green High Road and on busy days like Wednesday, the poor gardens end up looking a bit worse for wear.

Enter our Goodgymmers.

Dave, Clare, Raj, Latoya, Niamh and Gramps were at their best behaviour and methodically made their way through the gardens. So many ciggie butts, Reader. So many.

This task is always, perhaps ironically, quite loud and tonight one of the punters utilising the square's ample benches for a spot of public inebriation took offence at a group of people volunteering their evening away, clearing up other people's litter. What a bunch of wrong'uns.

Undeterred, our Goodgymmers took it all in good spirits and we collected a big total of two full-ish road sweeper bin bags by the end of the evening.

We then made our way to the Mall on the High Road in search of an owl and some soft pretzels.

Boom.

Tonight Goodgym Haringey were back at their long-standing regular task location (and original base) Tottenham Green.

This task had been a long time coming. After years of looking after the garden of the former nursery building on site, it was time for the Friends of Tottenham Green to hand it back to the council so the building can be refurbished and turned into a new cafe. But not before plundering it of anything remotely useful!

First the team got stuck into litter picking the various flower beds around the green. Meanwhile Sarah was given the task of cutting all of the burdock plants back to the ground before their seed heads could disperse thousands of seeds into the surrounding soil. She also helped task owner Laura harvest some hollyhock seed heads so that the seeds could be saved before the garden is bulldozed.

The garden was also full of moss which Laura says makes really good compost. Sam and Raj spent some time shovelling it all up so it could be put on the beds at the side of the garden.

Soon all of the tasks were complete, and although it was time to say a permanent goodbye to the old nursery garden the team can look forward to the new cafe opening.

5 Goodgymmers gave the Westbury Banks Nature Reserve a facelift through a bit of hardcore gardening.

Mindful Unwinding

Our Goodgymmers arrived at the Westbury Banks Nature Reserve to find that the site looked a bit untidy from the outside so we rolled our sleeves up and got on with the job of beautifying this much loved community space.

Julie, Latoya, and Sarah weeded and brushed to their hearts content the outside perimeter of the Reserve while Gramps and Rosa engaged on a bit of hardcore pruning in the inside of the fence. Julie in particular enjoyed unwinding the ivy from the fence before applying the chop. To be fair to her, it was a pretty relaxing affair, if I'm honest.

It was right about this time that our Sarah began shouting about pirri pirris.

What's a pirri pirri, you ask? Well, those little prickly seeds that stick to you while you're gardening, Kiwis lovingly call them pirri pirris. Every day is a school day with Goodgym Haringey.

Proving that we were no pirri pirri chickens, we cracked on and worked for a full hour before retiring to the local watering hole for a sport of rehydration.

Boom.

Seven Goodgymmers met for a good forking and nattering session at Tottenham Green on a lovely mild Spring evening.

Rake It Until You Make It

We had been invited to Tottenham Green to lend them a hand with the by now mythical renovations to the Nursery building that the Friends Group has been patiently waiting for going on... erm.. an eternity.

Alas, it wasn't to be this time either but lucky for us, Laura from the Friend's Group always has a plethora of jobs to complete. Tonight we were entrusted with turning over and transporting two big piles of compost (which we had helped create last year!) over to one of the flowerbeds at the edge of the Green, and also move an awful lot of sticks into a more manageable stick pile in the composting area of the Nursery.

With no time to waste, our Goodgymmers literally dug into the evening, armed with forks, spades, and in one particular case (hi Clare), one of our Goodgymmers embraced her inner ursine nature and attacked the pile with some bear claws, thus providing the unspoken third and most important option to the whole 'Man v Bear in the woods' discussion du jour - Be The Bear! #WomanPower #SmashThePatriarchy But also, #MenDoBetter

Anyway, we worked swiftly and efficiently, finding time to catch up with our lives, bother Charlie asking him to identify every little insect and bug we found, put Julie in a bin, and make plans for a social when our Alex is back from Glasgow for a bit. 

Before you knew it, our self-appointed time-keeping martinet Nurjehan was tapping her foot and banging on about it being 8pm so we said our goodbyes, but not without giving Laura a hand and taking some selfies.

As a I said, a lovely Spring evening

Join us next week as we help the folk at Moselle Meadow create a natural pond!

Have you heard the one about the 5 Goodgymmers litter picking a Looney-Tunes-style pile of cans from Tottenham Green on a surprisingly mild, march evening? No? Well, you're in luck...

Edging Our Bets

On an evening when Plan A failed, the wonderful Laura from the Friends of Tottenham Green swooped in to our rescue despite feeling positively under the weather and arranged a fun session for us.

And it was much needed as a bunch of fine young men had decided to use the central path at the Green as a makeshift Reuse & Recycle Centre after what looked like a few days long drinking bender. I mean, the scale of this pile of rubbish was so cartoonish in its breadth.

Undeterred, our Goodgymmers tackled the industrial-sized pile in good spirits while some of the aforementioned young men questioned the finer points of running for fun, while also correctly identifying the level of hotness of our Dave.

Before you knew it, and a good 8 (!) full bags at last count, the Green resembled a public park again rather than a rubbish dump and Laura tasked us with our second job for the eve. On the High Road side of the park, we were asked to give some flowerbeds a proper manicure and redesign the edges of the beds. Overgrown and covered in old leaves and soil, it was difficult to see where the bed ended and the path began so we armed ourselves with spades, forks, and brooms and got on with it.

Reader, our Goodgymmers were natural-born manicurists. Little by little, the edges of the bed began to be redefined again and in what looked almost planned, we completed the job just as the clock hit Nurjehan Time™ (aka. 8pm).

We helped Laura collect the tools and put them back in her lovingly-curated shed and posed for some selfies before we headed off into the night. Boom.

Join us next week as we visit our Borough's Municipal Home to look after the Sunflower House Wildflower Meadow. Come!

It was an emotional rollercoaster for Gramps and GG Haringey this week. Tasks got postponed, there were illnesses, work duties, train strikes, and a football match stacked against the team.

Luckily, ever-faithful Laura from the Friends of Tottenham Green was able to step-in and our task for the night could go ahead. A huge thank you to Laura for accommodating us last minute, and to Gramps for organising that last minute while unwell!

Nurjehan and Veronika got to work with litter picking in a special location around some benches. There was a lot of litter to contend with, but they left it looking spick and span.

Meanwhile, Dan, Šana, and Charlie were armed with spades and an edging tool and were given the task of edging up the grass around one of the footpaths. Over the years, the grass had covered up a thin silver line that marked the edge of the path, but the team uncovered it again and even used the grass and soil we dug up to fill in some tyre tracks.

All that was left to do was take a group photo, tidy away our tools and head on home.