A CRAFTY woman joined forces with other knitters to make teddy bears for all of the children in her village.

Catherine Norman, 53, from Chesterton, near Bicester, decided to make the soft toys as a way to cheer up children who are stuck at home during the lockdown.

She said: “I've been working from home doing crafty things for a small living and one day I found this teddy bear pattern and this idea came to my head to knit teddies for children.

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“I put it in the community Facebook page and had lots of people telling me about children in the village and found out that there were actually a huge amount of children who live here.”

Ten other people helped knit more than 70 bears with her and they converted the village bus stop into a ‘Chesterton bear stop’. Children went to the bear stop on Friday to collect a teddy to take home.

Ms Norman added: “It went really well, the teddy bears went really quickly and we’ve made a note of the children who didn’t manage to get one and we’ll make more. I think we're all doing a lot for the NHS, but we can't forget about the children."