Well, that was a fun Wednesday night!

In a slight change to normal process, tonight was a one way run. We met at Fratton as usual and then headed to the beach (unusual!) where we picked up another 4 GoodGymers who met us at South Parade Pier. We then donned party hats, sparkly ties and rolled out the flags for a beach based photo shoot to celebrate 10 years of GoodGym! We may only be a baby area (16 months old) but we certainly feel part of the GoodGym family, plus we love an excuse for a celebration. We then had a shingle run over to Castle Field - jelly legs replacing a more structured fitness session. A couple of quick pics on the steps (site of our training run last month) it was time to head into Southsea to our task.

We had previously done a community mission where we loaded a van with all the donations that had been stored in the office and brought them to the shop. The transformation of an empty shell of a hairdressers into a stylish and well stocked charity shop in a month has been amazing. Massive kudos to GG member Anne for all her hard work on this and thanks for inviting us to help ready it for opening on Saturday. It looks AMAZING.

There were plenty of jobs for us to do:

• scrubbers: Toni cleaned the fridge and Judy cleaned the bathroom - there was a strong smell of lemon freshness after their efforts
• stuffers: Catherine, Jo, Rosie, Tony, Tracey & India stuffed the handbags so they looked full and stood up nicely on the shelves. We found out that Catherine used to work for Accessorise so was using her skills to set the bags up to perfection
• bookworms: Angela, Maxine, Maura & Rachel stuck pricing stickers on the books and DVDs while debating exactly what was fiction or non-fiction (Tracey's find of "Calm Down Boris" the 10th anniversary edition was particularly relevant...)
• doormats: Tim and Solo did an amazing job of fitting large doormats to the back and front of the shop.
• steamers: Sam & Pippa got steamy with the clothes & also spotted a couple of purchases for their own wardrobes!
• picture pricing: Jo and India got into the cupboard full of pictures to put the pricing stickers on them

We were also ably assisted by Molly, Anne's dog who was wandering around the shop saying hello to everyone and was sniffing enthusiastically when the cake came out! Yes, we finished the task with tea and cake before most people headed down to Panero Lounge for a bite to eat and to continue the celebrations.

We passed round the GoodGym book "Fit Together" containing stories from the last 10 years & listened to some talented accent impersonations! I'll be bringing a copy to the next few group runs / community missions so you can have a look if you missed it.

Next up with have a community mission to St Judes (Thursday 19th) followed by Super Saturday (21st) when we have FOUR good deeds to get involved with (Thank You to Maxine and Judy for help with setting these up). There are also plenty of other opportunities to get involved outside the normal Wednesday night group runs so check out the community missions listings

See you all very soon.