Sea Monkey Raffle Raises Over £500 for ReadWell UK

Sadly, the 2014 Manchester Children’s Book Festival has come to an end. We had a fantastic week packed full of incredibly talented children’s authors at various venues across Greater Manchester. 

Sea Monkeys were donated to Manchester Children’s Book Festival by talented knitters and creative crafters, and were raffled off throughout the Festival to help raise money for ReadWell UK. ReadWell is a charity that regularly provides brand new, carefully selected, fun and interesting books to children in hospitals throughout the UK. It is a fantastic cause, of which we are lucky enough to have working hard in Manchester Children’s Hospital.

We held multiple raffles over the course of the 11 day Festival, winners are as follows:

Friday 27th June – Manchester Children’s Book Festival Launch Gala

Andrew Biswell, Professor of Modern Literature at Manchester Metropolitan University, won Frankie

Jess Collinson-Shields from Browne Jacobson won Happy

Frankie (Left) Happy (Right)

Saturday 28th June – Festival Family Fun Day

Haleh Moravej, Senior Lecturer in Nutritional Sciences at Manchester Metropolitan University, won Uncle Diógo

Neil Harrison, History student and Editor in Chief of Student Press Office at Manchester Metropolitan University, won Bubbles for his children

Bubbles (Left) Uncle Diógo (Right)

Friday 4th July – David Almond in Conversation with Livi Michael

Tatyana Kartojunsky from Didsbury won Ollie

Isaac Abbs-Brown won Super, the super hero themed Sea Monkey

Ollie (Left) Super (Right)

Saturday 5th July – Cathy Cassidy, Darren Shan, Michael Morpurgo and Coope, Boyes & Simpson

Paul Davies won Zom, the Zom-B by Darren Shan themed Sea Monkey

Our second winner, ‘Poppy’, has not came forward! If you bought a raffle ticket at one of these events and your name is Poppy please contact us! You can send us an email with your raffle ticket number at r.bruce@mmu.ac.uk

Zom

Sunday 6th July – Carol Ann Duffy and John Sampson: Musical Afternoon Tea

Isabelle from Urmston won Maddy

Eleanor MacConnell of Musselburgh won Pierre

Joss Abbs-Brown won Mummi, the Secret Agent Mummy by Steve Cole themed Sea Monkey

Shakira Abbs-Brown won Bonnie

Maddy (Left) Pierre (Right)

Mummi (Left) Bonnie (Right)

Special End of Festival Raffle

Chris Connor won Cap’n Jesse Spike, the Vampirates by Justin Somper themed Sea Monkey

Cap'n Jesse Spike the Vampirate

We raised well over £500 from the Sea Monkey raffles, which combined with various other Sea Monkey money raising campaigns brings our grand total to a magnificent £1011! This means ReadWell will be able to buy a fantastic 185 books to cheer up children in the Manchester Children’s Hospital, as well as hiring a professional storyteller to read to the children. 

You can donate to ReadWell anytime you like:

Online: www.readwell.org.uk/donate

Text: READ98 £5 to 70070 (or your chosen amount)

Post: Send cheques payable to ReadWell at ReadWell, 26 Nailsworth Mills, Nailsworth, Glos, GL6 0BS

Thank you for everyone who contributed to ReadWell as part of the Manchester Children’s Hospital, and congratulations to all of our winners. If you didn’t win a Sea Monkey this time, don’t worry! We have a few select Sea Monkeys remaining and will be holding competitions as part of Manchester Children’s Book Festival in the run up to next year’s Festival.