“Doing a creative activity in a group like this is well out of my comfort zone – but you know what? I’m loving it”

Move over Monet! Make way for the GoodGym Art Collective!

Tuesday’s session at AbPhab Youth Club garden was a little different for us.

We swapped barrows for brushes and pick axes for paint as we decorated the new tire planters ready to receive their new plants

Usually full of lots of chat and laughing, this session was much quieter as we enjoyed some peace and quiet together, each focussing on our painting.

The warm evening sun and gentle breeze created the perfect setting for our alfresco creative session.

All agreed the sessions was VERY relaxing and we can’t wait to come back and finish the rest of the tires

The one with the lifts.

This is what GoodGym is all about. Friendship, heavy lifting, connection and sore muscles.

On Saturday we helped Barking Food Forest prepare the ground for the new shed, rainwater tanks and vegetable planters.

Pretty standard stuff, right?

Nah. We lifted the shed from its current position (notice 1st lifted structure) and got down to work with the soil. Level it up, folks! Yes, ax pick your way through that soil. Are your muscles burning? Good sign!

Now, lets lift that water tank (notice 2nd lifted structure) and move it behind the shed! Classic PIVOT! PIVOT! PIVOT! moment. Check out our insta reel for all that GoodGym goodness.

By now, we got 25 minutes left in our community mission. The ground is weedless, quite levelled, the water tank is now comfortably behind the shed and after some slight acrobatics from superstar-volunteer from Barking Food Forest we are all at ground level wondering how much more levelled that does this area needs to be. Apparently much more. As we were.

But, hey is that another water tank at the opposite end of Barking Food Forest? Yes, it is and we want it to sit on top of the first one. After a dynamic risk assessment (fancy H&S terminology, brownie point) we lifted the tank (notice 3rd lifted structure), moved it from one end to another, PIVOT! PIVOT! PIVOT! and up it goes.

Another classic community mission at GoodGym Barking & Dagenham.