Day 29 National Memorial Arboretum Staffordshire

Well, this was the memorial park to challenge all memorial parks. The National Memorial Arboretum was the brainchild of David Childs. He wanted to provide a meaningful memorial to all those who had served their country. With the support of Group Captain Sir Leonard Cheshire and the backing of the then Prime Minister John Major, along with a donation of 82 acres of reclaimed gravel by Redland Aggregates it became a reality. A huge amount of thought has been put into the planning of the buildings and the memorials themselves (which number over 300), along with plantings of over 40,000 maturing trees (many which are dedicated) . In the Millennium Chapel of Peace and Forgiveness every day of the year they have a dedication, with the last post and Reveille  being played along with 1 minutes silence. Vo and I were luckily enough to get in there in time this morning for this ceremony. It was very moving.
The armed forces memorial sits atop of a little hill made especially for the memorial. There are these amazing curved walls of Portland Stone on which the names of 16,000 service men and women of the British Armed Forces who have been killed since the end of WW2 whilst on duty, died in operational theatre or been targeted by terrorists have been remembered. Fantastic that they have a place to go to. The designer of the memorial had the walls put up on the east side with a small gap between them so at the 11am on 11 November the sunlight shines through the gaps onto the bronze wreath in the middle of the monument. Amazing. We saw so many different memorials and what was really lovely about it was it was for all sorts of people to be remembered: a large amount of war ones but from lots of different regiments, policemen killed on duty, medic memorials, fire and ambulance, postal workers even still born babies.
The navy memorial was very beautiful being glass, the colour of the different oceans and at certain times of the day the shadow makes the shape of a battleship.
I was lucky enough to meet Phillipa from Creative Moments craft group who was putting up a collaborative project of a soldier standing in a field of poppies made of rag rug technique. Each person made a square and she joined it all together. It was beautiful and the poppies in particular were beautiful too. Vo brought me a beautiful poppy brooch and to end a lovely day members of the Northern Ireland medic corp let me have a photo with them!!