Newham charity to run Sleepover

Kay Atwal Thursday, January 31, 2013
2:08 PM

A group of 50 young children will be taking part in a big sleepover on tomorrow night organised by a charity to help raise cash for a project.

The event will be run by Aston-Mansfield to launch an exciting new project called the BIGSleepover.

The Charity which runs community centres in both Manor Park and Forest Gate has been using crowdfunding platform Buzzbnk, to raise funds for its project.

The BIGSleepover will run a series of overnight play events in Aston-Mansfield’s purpose built community centre in Manor Park - The Froud Centre - offering valuable respite care for hard-working parents in the area. It gives children the opportunity to take part in sleepovers in a supervised environment, an experience that is in decline in Newham due to a variety of issues such as low-income and overcrowded households. The BIGSleepover will be run by Aston-Mansfield’s ‘Little Manor Play Project’ a team of highly-qualified play-workers, who will deliver a stimulating and exciting experience for the boroughs children.

They have reached their first target on the crowdfunding platform Buzzbnk: www. buzzbnk.org/thebigsleepover and this has allowed them to get the project underway – whilst continuing to fundraise for future events.

Friday will see 50 local children arrive at the Froud Centre and kick-off proceedings with a pizza banquet. The centre will be booked out overnight and kitted out with a variety of activities from bouncing around on inflatables, face-painting, midnight movies to spooky story-telling.

This project gives hard-working parents the valuable chance for a night off, free of charge – knowing that their children are in an environment where cultural beliefs and traditions will be respected- and children the exciting opportunity to play with their friends overnight. The children will be free to take part in whatever activities they wish and upstairs rooms will be set aside for sleeping (one each for girls and boys) – that is if they actually get to sleep with all the fun games on offer!