A GROUP of enterprising and hard-working mums have finally managed to rebuild their nursery after a two-year fundraising effort.

Downhall Under Fives opened its new £150,000 pre-school building this week at the Ferndale Open Space, in Ferndale Road, Rayleigh.

The original Scout hut where the group had been meeting for 19 years was demolished in 2006 and, since then, the group has been based in a hall belonging to St Thomas of Canterbury Church, in Hullbridge.

But the pre-school, a non profit-making registered charity, said the hall was not suitable for its needs and too far from where most parents came from, in Rayleigh.

So the staff committee got stuck into two busy years of fundraising, which included publishing a raunchy Scrummy Mummies calendar, featuring members in saucy poses with their modesty preserved by strategically-placed building equipment.

They also held a barbecue, a street collection at Asda Rayleigh and quizzes, which managed to raise £20,000.

Essex County Council generously chipped in with grants, meaning they could get their new base built.

The committee and staff held an open morning at the new school so people could see the finished building. Hayley Bloomfield, 39, a mother of two children at the pre-school, and a member of Downhall’s building committee, said: “It all went very well. About 50 people came along and there were lots of happy parents and children. We never thought we would get this far.”

The nursery caters for 26 children, aged between two and five, offering care from 9.20am to 4.20pm. The single-storey portable building features one main room, with a messy play area and a quiet book corner. There is a large play area outside and a fully enclosed garden with a perimeter fence.