A PICTURESQUE nursing home on the outskirts of a Saddleworth village is asking locals to support a heart-warming initiative to help their 41 residents.

The kind-hearted team at Stoneswood, Delph, are focused on meaningful activities for residents in their social distancing bubbles and groups. And they are inviting locals to contribute by helping contribute to a “caterpillar” of stones in the grounds.

Caroline Winskill, assistant manager at Stoneswood, said: “After having a tough time with Covid we are now out the other side and wanted to reassure our residents family we are adapting and conscious of them not feeling isolated.

“Stacey Valentine, the home’s new activities coordinator, created a 10-minute video to show our relatives all the good work and activities being done through lockdown.

“And she came up with the caterpillar as we want to involve the community too. Residents are encouraged to paint the stones but visitors they can drop off a stone to help our caterpillar grow and give our residents a wave to make them smile.

“We are going to include all our residents and personalise the stones to say something about them.

“We have residents with advanced dementia who have painted stones with fingers prints. I think it’s great all residents, staff and the community can be involved,” she added.