What a crowd! We gave up counting after one hundred had crowded into Stamfiord ACF’s Club Room on 27 November to celebrate our labours and the results of this year’s Poppy Appeal. It was, literally, standing room only for the latecomers.

And we had a success to celebrate. Mike Nelson, our PAO, announced that our Poppy Appeal had already exceeded £33,000, with more still to be counted. He thanked everyone who had worked so hard for this success, especially the backroom workers who scurry around delivering and collecting Poppy boxes, counting the cash, and those who spend hours at the collection points and on the MDU. He led a general round of applause for all who helped.

Our guest of honour, Grp Capt Damien Alexander, Station Commander RAF Wittering, then presented our Poppy Appeal certificates to our star collectors – those heroes and organisations which had each collected or contributed more than £100. Among the many recipients, some especially stand out – the Peterborough 5x5 Challenge Team (£2,100), the ATC (£1,257.07), the ACF (366.05), Keith Langley (£462.86) and Kevin Howard (£714.00), not to mention the collective efforts at the three supermarkets which raised £21005.33 between them.

It was a particular pleasure to welcome representatives from Morrisons and Sainsburys to our celebration. Morrisons even contributed to our raffle which itself raised a further £145 for the Poppy Appeal.

There is something about our Poppy Appeal parties, beyond celebrating the results of hard work, which seems to generate a great event; our many thanks to all who contributed – Mike Nelson, Grp Capt Alexander, Helen and Wendy, Roy and Marian, John Copeland, all the contributors to the raffle, all our collectors and the backroom volunteers.