It was an early start for a group of GoodGymmers this fine Sunday morning as we came together to set up the Otterspool prom water station for the Liverpool half marathon. Three GoodGym members were taking part, Vikky, Roz and Emma, while Sallyann was running the Bath half marathon the same day. We were looking forward to cheering on our friends along with the rest of the runners, and got going setting up our tables either side of the route. As we prepared by unpacking crates of water bottles from a shipping container, opening the bottles and screwing the tops back on so they were ready to hand out, there was a growing sense of anticipation as we waited to see the first runners pass by. Not many of the leading runners wanted water, leading to the teams on each side of the path competing to hand out water to those who did and jokingly boasting about our bottle tallies. This was soon forgotten as we began to get steadily busier and were very quickly deluged with runners as the main body of the race passed by. Even though our stock of prepared bottles filled three trestle tables, it vanished very quickly and everyone was working flat out either unpacking bottles or handing them out. We were so overwhelmed that eventually we had to give up unscrewing them, something that has never happened before in our time running the water station for this race - there were 9 thousand runners this year, an increase of about 2 thousand on previous years, and it really made a difference! Despite how intense it was we kept up a cheer for all the athletes as they passed, and when we spotted Roz, Emma and Vikky we made sure to shout extra loudly for them. As the race drew to a close we turned our attention to our next big task - collecting up all the bottles the runners had thrown behind them. Charmaine, who happened to be passing by on a walk, got stuck in to help which was amazing, and even signed up as a GoodGym member later that day - a big thank you, Charmaine! With the extra help we powered through the clean-up and collected a staggering 52 rubbish sacks full of plastic bottles. We were all quite sobered to see the scale of plastic waste and are really hoping to see a more sustainable solution for next year's run. As for this year though, it was hard work but good fun and made enjoyable by the camaraderie and conversation of the GoodGym team - huge thanks and kudos to everyone!

One of our regular, and favourite, tasks: The Mulgrave Street Project, lead by the indomitable Khan, was preparing to go national!

A camera crew arrived bright and early on Saturday morning to document the amazing work of Khan and his volunteers at the Urbanscape Community Garden, for a new ITV1 show: Alan Titchmarsh's Gardening Clublaunches this month.

The new series, produced by Penny Lane Entertainment, is part-funded by GreenThumb, and will see Alan Titchmarsh, along with a team of experts, providing practical gardening tips for both aspiring and experienced gardeners

New GoodGymer, Melody arrived for her first session and was soon planting and weeding enthusiastically.

With fellow GoodGymers, Bekah, Ellie and Aditi, we worked through the morning to plant, weed and litterpick.

The garden looked amazing in the morning sunlight, extra shrubs and bushes were planted and trays of primroses added splashes of colour to the borders. And even though the sunshine soon gave way to persistent rain, it did not dampen our spirits.

The camera crew worked around us, capturing the community spirit, interviewing Khan, community volunteer Lizzie...and even had a few words with me.

By midday, cold, wet, but happy with our efforts, we tidied up and left Khan chatting with our newest GoodGymer, Tariq, who had dropped by to check out the garden.

Remember, to see the results of our labours, look out for the new TV series: Alan Titchmarsh's Gardening Club...

For tonight's task, a group of Goodgymmers teamed up with friends from Litter Clear Volunteer and It'sYour World.Liverpool, led by the fabulous Vicky, to work our combined magic on the L8 Cliff Green park.

This is a small community green nestled amongst houses that could be a real local asset, but has sadly been neglected for far too long and had become an overgrown dumping ground covered in litter and dog dirt when Vicky decided to rescue it. She told us that on LCV's first litterpick of the area they collected a huge 25 bags, and they had clearly done a good job as our volunteers on litterpicking duty today had to look hard to find litter in the park, so much so that Sallyann and Ellie went off on an adventure collecting litter from the surrounding streets. We were just starting to get worried not having seen them for a while when they turned the corner carrying bulging bags of litter as a souvenir of their travels around Smithdown.

Vicky is good at keeping everyone busy and there was plenty for everyone to get involved in apart from litterpicking; the main task of the day was to clear the grass that had overgrown the path, so everyone got stuck in to digging, shoveling and scraping up clods of grass and earth, or collecting them up and tidying the path edges.

Together we managed to clear the entire path on both sides, and we were all amazed at how much wider the path really was compared to how it had seemed when we arrived. It's always good to be able to see the difference we've made at the end of a session and even in the dark that was really clear and a great reward for our hard work.

Vicky told us that the local residents are now beginning to plan how they are going to use the green when it is in better condition and that they would like to set up a bouncy castle there in school holidays for the children to play on. It will be great to see this green space being reclaimed by the community and hopefully becoming a safe and fun play space.

Well done to Katy and Gerard for their first GoodGym session!

Watch this space for the next installment!