98-year-old Preston 'Wonder- Woman' knits 600th poppy in six years for Remembrance Day

Well-known for her knitting, ex-seamstress Violet Fortt, 98, has knitted 100 poppies each year, all of which sold immediately in Cumbria and Lancashire. Her poppies have also been given to The Moorings Retirement Home at Lytham.

"I started before the war when people were evacuated. Things were just all over the place at that time.

"Then I was sent to needle school as a teenager where I first learned ladies' bespoke tailoring.

"I trained to be a seamstress for three years on a scholarship at the traditional Debenhams of today in the late 1930s before the war."

She added: "I have done so much in my life, I have had an amazing marriage and knitting these poppies is something that just keeps me going and I do it every year. It is wonderful."

"It keeps my fingers well, they are very nimble, But it keeps me busy and I love to see the end product and the difference it can make."

Despite her years, Violet is amazingly fit, gardens every day and does this work in memory of her late husband Dalton Fortt who fought as a Chindit in Burma during WW2.

Violet was also injured by a bomb blast in WW2 which blasted open a door affecting the right side of her face. "I have never been right with that side ever since."

"The war was a really rough time for us all. My husband was sent to five warzones in the war, including in Afghanistan, Lebanon and Northern and South Africa. When he came back he was a wreck and never really got better throughout his life.

What's her secret to staying young at heart then? "When you get older life creeps up on you, but you have to keep your mind and body together. I have gone through enough in the war and never grumble at everything.I stay positive and keep myself busy. My neighbours call me Wonder Woman because I am always out tending to my garden.

"I am lucky at my age to do what I do."