PUDSEY bear and BBC Children in Need brought a splash of colour to Cumbria last week, with fundraising events held across the county.

Every year, people don the charity’s iconic yellow colours to raise money for disadvantaged children and young people in the UK.

And Cumbrians did their bit to raise some money, with a little help from the famous yellow bear.

Castle Park School, Kendal, held a rainbow-themed day, allowing children to come in dressed in the colours of the rainbow in exchange for a donation to Children in Need, with more than £350 being raised.

The school then got together to create a ‘human rainbow’ on the playground.

Elsewhere in Kendal, the town’s sea cadets held a bake-off, raising £38.40 by selling treats brought in by members.

At Grasmere School, there was “joy, amazement and excitement all bundled up into one sound” as the doors were thrown wide to welcome Pudsey.

The bear paid the Lake District school a visit with pupils set to raise money for Children in Need through three separate events next month: the Christmas Fair at St Oswald’s Church, Grasmere, the school’s nativity, and the children’s performance of ‘A Midwinter Night’s Dream’.

At Witherslack, three-year-old Annabelle Inman decorated cakes and proudly sold them to friends and family, raising £20.

In Kirkby Lonsdale, the Rotary Club of Lunesdale sported beaming smiles on a bitterly cold Friday morning outside Booths, with a whopping £1,609 raised by club members and staff inside the store.

Meanwhile, in Over Kellet, near Carnforth, pupils at Wilson’s Endowed CE School made a donation to go in wearing brightly-coloured clothing.

Cakes sent in by parents were also sold and pictures of Pudsey were covered in coppers by the children. In total, more than £150 was raised.

And 17-year-old Josh Marshall, a gardening apprentice at Levens Hall, concluded the mammoth 400-mile Rickshaw Challenge with five other young people, which saw them cycle from Holyhead, Anglesey, to Borehamwood to raise money for Children in Need.