This was the last of the tasks in the busy first four days of January. It was great to meet Dan and Jaime who had recently moved to York and had previously been involved in Goodgym in London. Dan and David started by replacing the nets on the basketball hoops before joining everyone else to cut back the ivy on the top if the wall. We also cleared and tidied some of the beds around it. By the end we had cleared a lot of the ivy back from the top of the wall to prevent it damaging the wall.

Theatre@41 is an independent theatre in York in a beautiful old church. Perhaps just a touch more beautiful in the outside than the inside - some of the back stage areas need a bit of TLC. In classic GoodGym fashion we made it look way worse before hopefully someone else makes it look better again.

We were tasked with stripping all the peeling paint we could reach in the green room and a stairwell. I say "green room" it was either brown or purple depending on who you asked but definitely not green. Either way, the paint was held on the wall only by force of habit and came off in sheets with the lightest on touches - in some areas not even needing a paint scrapper, it could be brushed off with a broom. For the team on the stairs it was more a case of knowing when to quit: it was a blurry line between peeling paint and crumbling plaster.

In much less than the alloted hour we'd stripped the paint from everything we could reach and turned to sweeping up, cheered along by Michael playing if you're happy and you know it on the piano. Then Nikki brought out her delicious banana and date cake before a team photo on the stairs like the bunch of luvvies that we are.

🦫 17 eager beaver GoodGymmers decided to kick off 2026 with a bang by volunteering at NYD parkrun 💥

🥶 It was a chilly one, which began with a debate as to whether or not we saw the sunrise (and therefore how many January Challenge bingo squares could be ticked off) 🌅

🥧 Carb-fuelled by pie (and potentially hampered by cocktails), there were pacers, marshalls, timekeepers, number-checkers, funnel managers (always a tricky one, especially when it comes to the decision of whether it’s a double or triple funnel day) and a parkwalker (plus friend 🐕).

🥪 Soon, it was time to regroup and warm up at the Knavesmire with a very welcome butty. The work wasn’t over for everyone as Louise had nobly volunteered to token-sort (and roped in the rest of the table to help, with very little persuasion). After some healthy debate with the regular token-sorting team as to the correct method, we reached an amicable approach that everyone seemed happy with and (equally importantly), got the job done ✅

🏠Then it was time to head home, for a brief reprieve for some even eagerer beavers who were heading to this afternoon’s double tree task session 🌳

🤩 Thank you everyone, and Happy New Year 🥳