Fuel shortages and food shortages have made this a very challenging week at the Oxford Mutual Aid food bank. As the only source of emergency food available in Oxford 7 days a week they are a lifeline to many, particularly as the furlough scheme and universal credit uplift both end.

This week, overall, the team packed and delivered 257 regular food parcels, reaching an incredible 857 people (494 adults, 254 children and 74 babies).

There were 56 requests for Emergency food help. Those parcels reached 164 people (109 adults, 43 children and 12 babies).

ALSO:
* 234 pre-prepared meals were given to 81 households.
* 51 food parcels were sent out to those people recently rehoused in temporary accommodation.
* 15 parcels were given to Syrian Sisters to distribute.
* 11 parcels went to Oxfordshire Asian Women's Voice in Rose Hill.

Thank you for taking part in this BIG voluntary effort. You're awesome.

Welcome to GoodGym Marta!

Wednesday afternoon at Oxford Mutual Aid: food parcels packed, fridges organised, cardboard taken out for recycling, a few emergency requests processed, old fruit sent off to be pig food, some restocking and stock taking. We even had time to make a start on the Thursday parcels for delivery.

Fabulous work to a fabulous soundtrack.

We're becoming regulars at the Warneford Hospital, with monthly visits to the Highfield Unit. The Highfield Unit is the young person's mental health in-patient unit. It has a huge garden, which is lovely, but tricky to keep under control with limited gardening staff.

Since our last visit at the beginning of May the whole garden has undergone a growth spurt, and so we came prepared to do serious battle with brambles, weeds, and unruly shrubbery.

We split our team of 22 between 3 garden sections to work on the public area at the front of the unit, the area outside the dining room, and the furthest garden space (which we haven't worked on quite so much on previous visits). Loppers, secatueurs and wheel barrows were in high demand as we pruned, weeded, and detangled huge amounts of brambles, creating mountains of cuttings to be wheeled and dragged round the corner to the compost pile. In a few areas the windows of the young people's rooms were starting to get blocked by brambles and shrubs, so we particularly focused on trying to clear those so that they can look out onto the garden again and not have the daylight blocked out. Jessy and Hattie did an amazing job to clear the brambley corner which we've been meaning to get to on every visit, unearthing a lovely rosemary bush under all the thorns, and Matty proved to be the master of bramble root removal (all the practice at Marston Forest Garden at the weekend paying off). Out front the team unearthed a memorial plaque which had been hidden by the undergrowth, tamed the shrubs, and (less excitingly) removed the inevitable litter and discarded clothing tucked away amongst the plants. No pants found, which is a relief, but Vicky's homing instinct for clothing unearthed a Tshirt which has seen much better days.

It's easy to lose track of time when there's lots to do, particularly on a lovely summer evening with a hot air balloon floating overhead and plenty of chatter (dinner recipe top tips, and some quite philosophical analysis of walking going on). It turns out that bramble removal is worse than litter picking for needing to grab JUST ONE MORE before packing up! Still, over-running when it's a summery joy to be outside isn't a chore.

We'll be back at the Highfield Unit again before too long, as there's plenty of regular work needed in such a large garden. It can't be easy to have your child as an in-patient in any hospital, but knowing that they're in a pleasant environment hopefully goes some way towards making it a less traumatic experience.

We were very happy to have a GoodGymer-onTour from Newham tonight - good to meet you Justin.

Welcome Lasha - hope you enjoyed your first GoodGym experience.

Things are getting re-thought and rearranged at Oxford Mutual Aid at the moment, and so although it was still Wednesday we were presented with a list of Thursday's parcels to prepare. We like a bit of forward-planning, and are happy to turn our hands to anything helpful, so Thursday prep it was.

We picked and prepped 20 Thursday parcels, packed 8 Wednesday emergency food deliveries, emptied bins and cardboard corner, loaded cars with deliveries, did a food drop (thanks Anna!) and crated and shelved up bread donations.

Well done the Wednesday Oxford Mutual Aid team!