Huddersfield’s oldest resident Ivy Clegg celebrated a big birthday with family and friends – her 107th.

Amazing Ivy, who lives at a care home in Moldgreen, had just four candles on her birthday cake – not 107 – but took great delight in blowing them out.

And when staff at the home presented her with a bunch of flowers the centenarian promptly burst into tears.

“I came here for a holiday and stayed,” said Ivy, who lived on her own until last year. “Everybody here is very agreeable. They put up with me!”

Aden Court Care Home, Moldgreen resident Ivy Clegg blows out the candles of her 107th birthday cake.
Aden Court Care Home, Moldgreen resident Ivy Clegg celebrates her 107th Birthday. Ivy is happily overwhelmed by her flowers.

Ivy grew up in Almondbury and left school at the age of 14 to make carpets for Sykes & Tunnicliffe in Northfield Mills.

She married Clifford Clegg in 1933 at Almondbury Church and the couple went to Blackpool for their honeymoon.

Ivy gave up work when she married and the couple had two children together – Phillip, who died shortly after birth, and Peter, who she was a stay-at-home mum to.

She was widowed more than 40 years ago and looked after her father, Arthur Leonard, who lived to be 100. Her son Peter passed away three years ago aged 74.

Ivy spent her 107th birthday with her 85-year-old niece Audrey Barber, her 69-year-old daughter-in-law Linda Clegg, her 79-year-old friend Jean Bower and the staff at Aden Court Care Home, where she lives. She got a card from the Queen, a cake and flowers.

Up until last year, she was living independently at home and up until she was 100, she was still cooking family meals and going on trips to Blackpool.

And she’s still got a lot to look forward to as next month she’ll become a great-grandmother for the first time when grandson James becomes a dad.

Meanwhile Ivy had some sage advice for the younger generation when she smiled: “Keep clean and tidy!”