A little girl who wanted to cheer up her neighbours has raised over £300 for NHS charities.

Jessica Denver, who turned six last week, started making small rainbows with her Hama beads.

When people started trying to to pay for them, however, her parents set up a JustGiving page for the NHS.

They began selling the beaded rainbows for 50p each.

“We hoped she would raise about £50,” said mum Hayley Thomlinson, “but within hours she had £200 and ended up with £308.”

Jessica made hundreds of rainbows herself but Hayley admitted that she later stepped in to help.

She said: “It was just getting a bit too much for her and that is why we have now closed the page.She did very well.”

More impressive than any money raised was the reaction.

Jessica, a pupil at Victoria Infant School, said: “I got a headteacher award and my teacher sent me stickers.”

She has also received a certificate of thanks from the NHS.

In fact fundraising has taken a bit of a back seat to Jessica’s birthday on Saturday.

“I got a unicorn cake,” she said. She and dad Paul Denver and little sister Sophia, 2, enjoyed a tea party together.

“Friends and members of the family also came to wish her happy birthday over the garden wall,” Hayley said.

She said she was proud of how her daughter had kept on with the beads.

“It was a lot of commitment for her - and, of course, we had to keep buying new sets of beads," she said.

“In the end it was getting too much for her. I started helping her after she went to bed at night, But she did most of the work herself. She did a great job.”

Hayley said the family was delighted by how much Jessica was able to raise.

And it did not seem to have put her off Hama beads, but not to make rainbows.