It was back to the business of cleaning, measuring and cataloguing donated Things for the Library of Things, indoors and slightly warmer than it could have been with a yellow warning for ice after the day's snow.*

A bizarrely high number of hoes and drills were in the pile of Things to be listed (to be fair, I'm not sire what a non-bizarre number would be), along with camping chairs, DIY tools, a vintage seeing machine and the inevitable tent which we managed to get back into its slightly-ripped (not by us) bag. Its the only time us GoodGymmers are allowed to touch power tools so we made the most of testing, invluding the dreaded hedge-trimmers.

It was great to see more items joining the inventory and another Library opening soon in Frenchay so even more Bristolians can borrow items instead of buying and storing them.

We were soon on our way again, it seemed to have warmed up a bit and we grabbed a drink at Bar + Block as it was a bit chilly to sit out by the water whilst the speed dating happened at Workout.

Hopefully we'll be back at least once in January to sort through lots more Things!

*no snow in Castle Park

There was a break in the weather for the GoodGymmers who met up in the darkening warmth of Queen Square, armed with gloves, headtorches and issued with litter pickers and bags.

Off we set, the running group led by Vaguely Northern Darren in one direction and the walkers in another, with a plan to arrive at Redcliffe Nursery School and Children's Centre at the same time - which worked surprisingly well!

Three jobs to manage:

1. Clear the litter from the car park that's used by local residents and was already full of cars, so some interesting stretches (possibly yoga at a push!) and a top find of an actual (probably actual fake) Dior bag (OK, little paper gift bag)

2. Into the outdoor play area to shift sand into the sand pit - we couldn't find the sand that wasn't already in the sand pit, so claim full credit for this although it was already shifted.

3. Sweep and bag the leaves from everywhere they'd collected - this was the main event and, of course, involved climbing ONTO the equipment to check for and sweep leaves, especially by Frances whilst Roddy and Jason targeted the High Leaf Fall area of the side slide. Richard, Darren and Caroline struck paleontology gold with dinosaurs in the sand/leaf mixture.

Discussions of the evening led to punny versions of childhood songs from our resident Choir Leader Frances, especially "Dior Ears Hang Low" which is a pun we're saving for the next time we find Dior (-ish) items.

A great evening and we almost beat the rain!

It was a Great Moon, but was it really a Super Moon?

Our regular corner of Queen Square was a bit congested with filming happening nearby AGAIN (Young Sherlock?) and we even had our own security guards who were Very Chatty Indeed. Not convinced it was just the caffeine from the Monster can talking...

We set off for a lovely sunny walk or run to Dame Emily Park with lots of other people out and about enjoying the warm evening. Melanie found a phone before we'd even left the square, and that will shortly be posted off to it's owner who'd been on a visit day to Bristol from Swindon. Obviously the phone preferred Bristol, who wouldn't?

The next find was a highland cow badge, but like Jason by the M Shed, it set my camera focus to "obscure" to avoid publicity.

At the park, the runners had just beaten the walkers and Ursula was explaining the wildlife work of the evening - cutting back an overgrown hedge that was also home to a tall sycamore trying to take over, finding the bulbs and rescuing the pollen-y plants that had been trampled, clearing the tarmac waster, salvaging the wood and digging over another trampled flower bed and having loads of fun in the process.

• The hedge was soon looking smaller (I'm not sure about tidier...), with some high wielding of long-handed shears and loppers by Caroline, Vaguely Northern Darren, Ed and Jason
• Ciaran took the saw to sort out the sycamore and was joined by Marianne who relinquished her colour-matched secateurs to make sure the big branches weren't falling too far from the tree
• A few bulbs and some salvaged plants were set aside by Azzurra and Kim and the soil sieved to remove errant rocks
• A big pile of wood emerged from the tarmac and rocks and neither Richard nor Roddy fell in the small pond - the wood will be great for making the bug and hedehog hotels

And we created a new job of transforming the fallen sycamore into whips that can be used to weave a low level wildlife-friendly hedge around the pond (which, I stress, no one fell into).

As the lovely sunlight faded, the moon was looking HUGE and we later discovered it was a Super Moon - but we liked it before we knew it had a posh name. We loved the lemon and ginger tea and biscuits Ursula had carried over with her, and offered to help put away all the tools but we think Ursula may have wanted some peaceful time to enjoy the Super Moon herself, and probably wanted everything put away in the right places...

Off we trotted, walking and running back to Queen Square and saw the security guards had moved a bit and it was different guards on duty so we snuck past them and headed on to Workout where we avoided being dragged into the Speed Dating and the Liverpool supporters were sad when AC Milan scored in the third minute. But all came good in the end.

There's been lots of construction at Dame Emily Park where the Community Garden now has concreted raised beds instead of rotting planters and they've taken the opportunity to sift soil to remove the big- and medium-size stones. With mushroom boxes over buckets to keep it real.

With a team on the main stone-removing, a second team on the in-planter stone removing and a third team weeding, boarding and mulching the berry plants, it was all systems go in the fading sunshine with everyone trying to keep warm.

Discussions included whether slo-mo would make the soul-sifting more action-packed and what music was appropriate for a speeded-up version and whether the Benny Hill theme tune was a saxophone. Full marks to Frances for knowing Yackety Sax.

Azzurra and Janka had made short work of the berry-mulching and, with full protection gloves, set about feeding the nettle soup with more lovely chopped nettles.

The soil-sifters had soon worked through enough soil to have topped up the first planter, with Vaguely Northern Darren and Caroline from the running group working in situ whilst Robin raked and taught them both some German, or Italian, or both.

The soil was then covered in cardboard weighted down with bricks and, because we're super-resourceful, the big stones from the soil sifting. Meanwhile, the medium-sized stones were making a path to the resources shed under the careful eyes of Bruce and Jason with Roddy and Marianne maximising the sifting-per-second speed.

With the work (almost) done, we enjoyed Ursula's refreshments - Blackberry juice and biscuits - and the empty wheelbarrow that had worked hard.

As Vaguely Northern Darren had hurt his back during the task, everyone decided to walk and talk back to Queen Square and onwards to sitting outside at Workout as there was speed dating going on, which we tried not to disrupt - honest!

See you all at the next one - Wednesday lunchtime, Wednesday evening, Friday morning,Bank Holiday Monday or next Tuesday.