Suns out, run out

We had 7 new runners join us tonight and 52 people out Good Deeding on this sunny Tuesday night. Welcome to Bex, Molly, Jayne, Sangrita, Laura, Andreas and Hannah - it was great to have you!

After a mental warm-up, we split into two groups.

Alison led a small group of 15 to Dame Emily Park where they met Mel to add to their team and Ursula who runs the project. The boys (under the (quickly corrected) assumption that they were stronger) were handed spades and a pick axe to put some shrubs in to create a border between the border and the Caretaker's house. The rest of the group tackled the planters outside the swimming pool, planting new trees and small flowers in them. Another group were sent to seed wildflowers at the bottom edge of the park and two others filled watering cans to water everything in. Meanwhile, Darren was working especially hard by keeping Ursula's little boy entertained in a football game - someone's gotta do it, isn't that right Darren?!

An elephant of sand

The rest of us headed off in our hoards to St Paul's Adventure Playground. We were met by Guy who had three huge tasks for the group - good job who brought so many pairs of hands. Group 1 were set to work with moving hay to make a soft landing under the zipline and play areas. Group 2 were moving large logs to a log store on the other side of the playground, which involved impressive log-carrying coordination (I have seen groups doing it worse in Highland Games). Group 3 had the mammoth task of moving a massive pile of cement blocks and two tonnes of sand to clear a space for the bread oven arriving tomorrow. It was hefty work and the team made the longest GoodGym human chain ever to overcome the task. The last bag of sand was moved with seconds to spare before we had to head back and Guy was thrilled with how much we had got done.

Shell shock

The group were not getting away to feast on Lisa's amazing 200 celebration baking without finishing off the night with an egg and spoon race. With only 2 drops (and consequent burpees) it turns out this might be our calling. Then it was time to celebrate the wonderful [Lisa] hitting her 200th Good Deed last Saturday - well done Lisa! Still drooling over those cakes...

And at least I've not cracked all my best egg jokes before the end of the report.

GoodGym Bristol don't just stop at one task on a stormy Tuesday evening. We don't even stop at two. We managed to squeeze doing three good deeds into one session (and avoided many a mammoth puddle from the earlier downpours as we did so). Welcome to Shannon, Gareth, Eloise and Nikki who joined us tonight for the first time - it was great to have you!

Our first good deed was helping Children's Hospice South West advertise for their Santas On The Run event on 9th December. To do this, 12 willing GoodGymers donned Santa Suits with signs about the run pinned to their backs to spread the word. With almost 50 runners gathering despite the stormy day, some would say it got a little Claustrophobic...

We soon overcame this by getting out, warmed up and set off to our tasks, with Dave being a brilliant backmarker to our mass of red t-shirts and Santa suits. We arrived at Hannah More Primary, where half of the group were going to helping. Ruth from Hannah More Primary introduced the group to the different jobs which they needed help with. The group split into two, with one group doing a litter-pick around the school grounds and the other clearing out the After School Club room. The key to this was not to get Santa-mental and the Santas and GoodGym elves managed this and got stuck in with equal vigour.

Meanwhile, the rest of the group who wanted to stretch their legs further, ran a mile further away where they grouped into small teams to successfully deliver leaflets advertising Santas On The Run and some more of the good causes who we have been working with recently. A couple of Santa sprints later and the group were satisfied with having spread the word in the south of Bristol and were ready to head back.

Our night was topped off by celebrating the very first Santurian... Well done to Alison who did her 100th Good Deed tonight! All with the impressive added extra of doing it in a Santa suit and wearing the famous Centurion outfit with the addition of a white beard. Spectacular.