A Berry Good Morning in Battersea 🌿🌞

What better way to kick off the weekend than with a GoodGym community mission that had a huge impact!

A brilliant group of GGers came together on Saturday morning, answering the call to help out at a thriving community garden in the heart of Battersea. This huge green space is a vital hub for local residents—a place to grow, connect, and learn. We're really happy to visit regularly to help keep it flourishing.

It was especially lovely to welcome some first-time GoodGymers—great to meet you Abadesi, Pranav, Adrian and Shreyasi and thanks for getting so stuck in!

There was certainly no shortage of jobs to tackle, and we going straight away. Tasks ranged from planting raspberry canes to clearing an overgrown area, de bind-weeding around a goji bush, and yes—digging not one, not two, but THREE holes to plant a beautiful new bay tree. There was weeding a-plenty, pruning, trimming and composting and a few mystery pipes to contend with, but it was nothing we couldn’t handle.

The energy was high, there was plenty of teamwork strong and even more laughs. It’s always amazing to see how much can get done when a group of motivated people come together. By the end of the morning, the garden was looking better than ever and Malissa was really pleased with all we got done.

We wrapped up the mission in the best possible way—with a trip to a local café for some well-earned tasty drinks and snacks. A perfect reward. Nice work everybody!

🌩️ Thunder, Tasks & Trivia Triumphs! 🌿🧠

A distant rumble of thunder kept us guessing as we gathered for this week’s GoodGym session, but it takes more than a bit of potential drama to throw us off course. Despite a power outage on the tube delaying our task owner, we were well-prepped with a list of garden jobs sent over in advance – and as always, we were ready to dig in.

Before setting off, we limbered up with a quick warm-up and this week's question was pub quiz themed: How many pubs are there in London? Guesses ranged wildly, but Jordan was closest to the correct answer – a a whopping 3,500 pubs! That’s a lot of potential quiz venues…

🌱 Once we arrived at the garden, we got straight to work. There was no shortage of tasks to keep us busy:

• Shifting lemon trees into position
• Plenty of watering to revive thirsty plants
• Weeding pathways and beds
• Sweeping away debris
• Turning compost and moving it around the garden

The garden was soon buzzing with activity and teamwork and the time flew by.

💪 With a few minutes to spare after finishing the tasks, we squeezed in a post-task fitness session featuring:

• A 3-minute mountain legs challenge
• A 3-minute arm burner, in honour of International Chest Day at the gym – we're very on-brand! The result? Some burning muscles and a sense of achievement!

🏆 Then it was quiz time - the team headed off to the pub. With the muscles having been given a serious workout it was time for the brains to get a turn in the hotseat. I'm happy to report the team absolutely smashed it, scooping gold. Huge congrats to all our GG geniuses!

📍 Next week, we’re heading to Paradise Cooperative to lend a hand. If you enjoyed working in the garden this week, don’t forget we have a weekly community mission to help out at the Doddington Community Garden Kids Club – check it out and sign up here.

Have a great week everybody!