I've never heard so many tree puns in one night. Which is kind of ironic because we didn't find many trees...

But it was still a good night for a run/stroll and we did find a few trees!!

We split into a few groups:

Charlie, Paul and I had a bit of luck finding two trees (one massive, one little) and one branch on the way to the tree drop-off point.

Catherine, Cat and JC (visiting from GG Greenwich 🥳) did a long route but alas only found a nice statue and a plastic tree :(

James, Clare and James took the hilly route to Sydenham Wells Park. No trees but 6k in the bag 💪

Better luck next year?!

Well done anyway for your combined energy and jogging. See you next week!

Six of us made our way up Anerley Hill tonight (it never gets easier...) to meet James and Teresa at the St Christopher's Hospice charity shop on the Triangle. Once there we sorted and steamed clothes, organised wall art, vacuumed and dusted to make the shop spick and span for Christmas shoppers. A couple of us even picked up our own bargains in the process!

Excellent work on our final group run of the year!

We had the first of our bulb planting tasks tonight, with nine volunteers making their way to Alexandra Recreation Ground to plant some tulips while the squirrels were asleep. The task almost didn't happen as our task owner Millie wasn't well (get well soon!) but Mark saved the evening by cycling to pick up the keys to the tool shed on his night off. What a legend!

Once we'd got the shed open, we had fun trying to work out which bulbs were tulips. Luckily our resident horticulturalist Rosie was on hand to guide us and give us tips on optimal bulb planting.

Our next challenge was breaking into the soil: as we've had very little rain over the last few weeks, the ground was rock hard, which definitely put the Gym in GoodGym. After a bit of trial and error, though, we perfected our hole digging technique (the spade as a pogo stick approach worked best) and in less than half an hour we had planted all our bulbs. Big shout out to Michelle who was taking part in her first task - I appreciate that digging holes in the dark is a pretty unconventional way to spend a Monday night (and definitely attracted some bemused looks from dog walkers...) so well done for getting stuck in!

After filling in our holes and covering them with leaves to confuse the squirrels, we ran back to the Bridge House for stretches. Excellent work team!