A teardrop of poppies has appeared at St James’ Church Wyesham thanks to a bunch of crafty ladies.

Wyesham WI teamed up with Wyesham Craft Club to put their talents to good use during lockdown. They began to knit and crochet poppies to decorate an exterior corner of the church in time for Remembrance Subday’s service there.Some provided the wool, others busied themselves with knitting needles and crochet hooks and produced nearly 800 poppies, in red and purple, the latter to remember the animals that also perished during the First World War and subsequent conflicts.They were unaware when they started that 2021 was the centenary of the Royal British Legion so it felt appropriate that the work was done this year.Sixteen million animals were used in the First World War and of those 484, 143 horses, mules, camels and bullocks were killed.More than 887,858 British and Colonial service personnel never returned home after the 1914-1918 conflict.Daphne Evans of Wyesham Wi said that in total there will be almost 800 poppies of different shapes, sizes and colours. "Our idea next year is to add another display of knitted and crochet poppies to adorn the gates at the entrance."Quite a lot of people cannot get down to the Shire Hall to see the display of poppies which the ladies contributed to last year so we will do this every year for the church as Wyesham people can walk here to see the display" she added.About 25 ladies took to the challenge during lockdown as a way of passing the time so the whole exercise has proved to be theraputicWith the blessing of the Rev Penny Powdrill, they set to the task, some producing one, others knitting hundreds taking about 30 minutes to knit one and about an hour to crochet one.Attached to some farmer’s net wrap that one of the ladies managed to acquire, the display is on show now and is a fitting contribution to Remembrance Sunday commemorations.