This August staff at Winton Library are offering free healthy lunches to children attending a series of special Roald Dahl storytime and craft sessions.
The Books & Butties initiative, funded by Salford’s The Booth Charities, is a pilot scheme to give children aged 4-11 a healthy lunch while they have fun with stories.
It has the added bonus of helping local parents and carers entertain young children over the summer.
The six-day trial runs from Monday 22 – Saturday 27 August between 11.30am and 1pm every day.
Each session involves a book-related performance, music and craft activities followed by a free healthy lunch and drink.
Master storyteller Roald Dahl created and wrote a number of classic children’s books, including Matilda, The BFG, George’s Marvellous Medicine and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Top 5 quotes from Roald Dahl books
“A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts it will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.”
– The Twits
“I is not understanding human beans at all,’ the BFG said. ‘You is a human bean and you is saying it is grizzling and horrigust for giants to be eating human beans. Right or left?’ ‘Right,’ Sophie said. ‘But human beans is squishing each other all the time,’ the BFG said. ‘They is shootling guns and going up in aerioplanes to drop their bombs on each other’s heads every week. Human beans is always killing other human beans.’ He was right. Of course he was right and Sophie knew it. She was beginning to wonder whether humans were actually any better than giants.”
– The BFG
“Well, maybe it started that way. As a dream, but doesn’t everything. Those buildings. These lights. This whole city. Somebody had to dream about it first. And maybe that is what I did. I dreamed about coming here, but then I did it.”
– James and the Giant Peach
“A little nonsense now and then, is cherished by the wisest men.”
– Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator
“And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.”
– The Minpins
There will be special guest readings at the Books & Butties initiative including actor and storyteller Sarah Jane Lee, and artist Louise Clarke.
36-year-old Deborah Sullivan from Winton, uses the library with her daughter Hetty, 5, and nine-month-old son Francis.
Deborah said: “We go quite a few times a year, mostly during the school holidays, but we think that events like this that Salford Community Leisure put on at the libraries are really interesting and much more likely to get us out of the house.”
Councillor David Lancaster, who represents Winton, said: “To this day Roald Dahl remains a family favourite.
“Reading his books while encouraging healthy eating is an innovative, fun way to educate young people and it promises to be a huge success.”
Books & Butties runs from 22-27 August 11.30am-1pm at Winton Library, Worsley Road, M30 8BY
Booking is not necessary and residents with children aged 4-11 are encouraged to drop in.
Main image: Angela Holt, Hetty Sullivan, Deborah Sullivan and baby Francis Sullivan at Winton Library
