If you're going to pick one week in your life to honour Canada's veterans, this week is it.

The federal government has designated Nov. 5-11 as Veterans' Week. Actually, 2005 is the Year of the Veteran.

Wearing a poppy is one way to show support for those who served.

If you're at Toronto's Guildwood GO Train station this week between 6 a.m. and 9 a.m., say hi to Fern Regan. She'll be out selling poppies, just as she's done for the last 12 years.

"It makes me feel like a million dollars, I am blessed to be here," the 83-year-old said, who stays on her feet the whole time despite some mild arthritis in her knees.

"I really support what she is doing," one commuter told CTV News Toronto. "My grandfather was at Vimy Ridge and my dad fought in the Second World War."

Regan's commitment is partly personal: Her brothers served during the Second World War, and her late husband Jack was also in the army.

This year coincides with the 60th anniversary of the end of the Second World War -- and a time when the number of veterans still alive from that conflict are dwindling at an ever-faster rate.

One high-profile death this summer was Ernst 'Smokey' Smith, Canada's last Victoria Cross winner, who died at age 91 in Vancouver. His funeral was Canada's largest military service since the death of First World War flying ace Billy Bishop in 1956.

As veterans die, small-town institutions like the Royal Canadian Legion branch in Donkin, N.S fight to survive.

Three years ago, the branch itself was in danger, burdened by costs such as skyrocketing insurance, but volunteers fought to keep the doors open.

"We had people here selling beans and fish cakes like you wouldn't believe," said volunteer Russell Powers.

As a result, there's a place for 80 local veterans or their widows to have a remembrance meal.

Powers said of three local cemeteries: "One had 76 military graves. That's quite a feat for a little village like this."

He also thought it was important to pass history along to the younger generation, as the time is coming when no veterans will be left.

In Winnipeg this weekend, ceremonies were held on Valour Road, where three Victoria Cross winners once lived, to commemorate a park in their honour at Sargent St.

"It happened to be the same street where three Victoria Cross winners lived. Not only the same street, but the same block. The chances of that ever happening are astronomical," said Col. Brian Batter.

The three soldiers awarded with the Commonwealth's highest decoration for bravery were Frederick Hall, Leo Clarke and Robert Shankland.

Hall was honoured for going to retrieve a wounded colleague outside the relative safety of a trench at Ypres in April 1915. He was mortally wounded in the process – one of more than 2,000 Canadians who died in a two-day battle.

Clark was honoured for his valour at Pozieres Ridge in France in September 1916. He would die in action a month later at Etretat.

Shankland was honoured for repelling a counter-attack at Passchendaele, Belgium in October 1916. He survived the war, served in the Second World War, and died in Vancouver in 1968.

The park "features tyndall stone monuments in the shape of the Victoria Cross, thematic signage in the VC colours of crimson, gold and black, and complementary decorative concrete work and plantings," says a City of Winnipeg news release.

Cobblestones are used to represent the streets of Europe in the war years. A sign showing a silhouette of the three soldiers will also mark the spot.

Besides the park, a new film debuted at the Winnipeg Art Gallery on the weekend. The Boys of Kelvin High, funded by the War Amps of Canada – is about Winnipeg's Kelvin High School.

Fifty students from there died serving in the Second World War's Bomber Command, one of the most dangerous tasks of that conflict.

Eric Hodgson, no longer a boy, but a veteran in his 80s, described the film's purpose this way: "Young people don't know what happened and why. So I hope the documentary does it for us."

Nov. 11 events

Activities celebrating Veteran's Week continue until Nov. 13, but the major national event will be Remembrance Day this Friday.

At 9 a.m. ET, the Seventh Book of Remembrance will be dedicated in the Hall of Honour at the Parliament Buildings in Ottawa. In attendance will be Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean and Prime Minister Paul Martin.

The National War Memorial service starts at 11 a.m. in the nation's capital. Ceremonies will be held at the National War Memorial.

Before that, veterans will gather for a veteran's parade.

And at the new Canadian War Museum, if the weather co-operates, the sun will shine on the headstone of the Unknown Soldier in Memorial Hall at precisely 11 a.m. on the 11th day of the 11th month – marking the time the "war to end all wars" concluded.