Table-Top Tournament

We celebrated the official opening of the Phoenix Centre on Saturday 14 November by organising a free table-top football tournament through a company called Goalden Events.

This appealed to all members of the family: sisters and brothers, mums and dads, grannies and granddads, uncles and aunties all took part. Katherine Kelly, who plays Becky on Coronation Street also joined in, as did the local Community Police.

Between tournaments visitors were encouraged to try a light-hearted quiz, to answer some of the questions you had to be sure to visit the library.

Look out for Goalden Events and your chance to compete in table football at the official opening of Darnhill Library on the 12 December!

Roald Dahl competition winners!

We have the winners for the "Create Your Own Roald Dahl Character" competition for children at Smallbridge Library!

Qudsia Choudry, age 10, is the winner with her Evil Snowman. Nicole Moore, age 11, is the runner-up with The Puzzler

Congratulations to Qudsia and Nicole, and to everybody who entered: we had a lot of fun looking at them all!

Spooks and Books at Balderstone Library

We had an afternoon of scary fun for children and their families this afternoon!
Justine and Maureen organised lots of crafts, games and stories. Children came in fancy dress with lots of witches, wizards, ghosts and ghoulies. And Ray came along to tell them some scary stories.

Two staff from Sandbrook Children's Centre came along to join in the fun and two food workers also came to make spooky sandwiches with the children

Maureen Watson said ' It was lovely to see so many families in the Library having such a good time. The session was really well attended with children, parents and carers making lots of things to take home.

Justine Smith said "I was thrilled with all the children who came in fantastic costumes and how successful the afternoon was."

33 adults and 51 children came to the party. Everyone seemed to have a good time and several people have already asked if we would be doing more sessions in the future.

More Halloween pictures from our libraries

Quest Seekers meet the Mayor

The Mayor of Rochdale, Councillor Keith Swift, presented the prizes for Design Your Family Shield competition and the Quest Seekers at The Wheatsheaf Library on Saturday 10 October. The children also had the chance to have their photograph taken with the Mayor and Mayoress Sue Etchells.

Before presenting the awards the Mayor spoke to the winners and their families, he said:

"It is really good to see all the winners here this morning with their mums, dads, grandparents and carers.The time and effort that you as parents put in with your children is well recognised, your support is pointing them in the right direction. Children are the future of the borough and with them the borough can progress."

The overall winner of the Family Shield Competition was Zanib Ashraf (aged 13) who was presented with an iPod Touch.

• The runners-up were Eve Whelan (aged 10) and Callum Purcell (aged 11) who won book tokens.
• Highly commended were Abigail Heslin (aged 10), Rebecca Shaw (aged 4) and George Denson (aged 5).
• Winners of the Quest Seekers prize draw were James Crompton (aged 11) who won a family day out to York Dungeon, and Danielle
  Cain (aged 8) who won a family day out to Leeds Armouries.

Well done everybody!

• More photos of the presentation

Backstage pass 1

Ever what goes on backstage with our Special Services Team? They're the people who provide the services for people with special needs, as well as the Doorstep Library Service and the Mobile Library.

Albert Shark RN joined them for a day to find out. Check out the pictures here.