Hundreds contribute to Lenny the Lawley snake and raise money for the NHS
Lenny the snake has helped raise hundreds of pounds for the NHS – not a bad effort for a creature made of stones.
Lenny is actually made up of more than 500 stones of all shapes and sizes, decorated and placed by the residents of Lawley in Telford.
It started with one mum and her family placing a handful of stones and a sign to explain, and grew to stretch about 100 metres alongside a popular bridle path near Birchfield Way.
See Lenny the Snake here:
Now a business has offered to donate 50p to the NHS for each stone up to 500, for a total of £250.
Camilla Norman, who began the project, said: "The idea came from a similar project that I’d seen being done down south. I decided to create a snake of decorated stones that children could add to and watch grow.
"Lawley has a great sense of community and I thought it was something positive for the children (and adults) to focus on during these difficult times.
"It’s been lovely to see how involved everybody has got and children have been visiting Lenny each day to see how much he’s grown.
"It originally started with just five stones, one each painted by me, my husband and our three sons and it’s now well over 500 stones long."
"There were a few incidents early on with stones being kicked or taken, so I added lots of signs so it was not to be confused with Shropshire Rocks [a project involving residents decorating stones and hiding them for others to find] but since it’s grown longer, this seems to have calmed down.
"It crossed my mind that people may not be reading the sign and may think the stones were put there for people to take and hide somewhere, but now that it’s so long I think it’s apparent that it’s something different.
"I’ve noticed that it has inspired some other snakes across the county now too, so what started off as a little idea between me and my sons for Lawley has now grown to become a trend around Telford and Shrewsbury."
A snake has also begun growing over the Welsh border in Llanymynech.
Camilla continued: "We also had a local company come on board as a sponsor – Ace of Trades have pledged to donate 50p to the NHS for every stone (up to 500 stones)."
The company will make the donation on Saturday, June 6, after Camilla counts all the stones today.
"The community have asked for Lenny to remain where he is so that he can continue to grow and travel around Lawley. Hopefully some other companies may come on board and pledge to donate for the stones that exceed the initial 500."
