A sparkling occassion

Our annual Sandcastle Ball took place last night at the Gosforth Park hotel. Once again it was a fabulous party evening superbly hosted by Steve Walls who also enterained during dinner by singing - what a a great voice.

Of course the Sandcastle Ball is connected with the Sandcastle Challenge last week. We are indebted to GB Building Solutions, especially Dawn Limerick and Martin Westgate of Robertson Construction, our main sponsors. Together with John Matthews, Ces Maddison, Brian Hodgkinson and Stu Burlinson they form the Sandcastle Committee who help organise the beach event and support the Ball. They give up their time for meetings, site visits, table sales, raffle & auction prizes in the run up to both events. So a huge thank you to them all.

Another big thank you to Stu who kindly brought his band 'Under The Radar' - what a treat, if you haven't heard them you should, they got everyone dancing and rocking the night away.

Thank you too to staff from Barclays Bank who volunteered their help on the night to make everything run smoothly alongside Children North East staff who also volunteer their time.

Congratulations to Clare Stagg of Plan It who won the Sandcastle Trophy for the best design, execution and construction on the beach working with Ryhope Infant School from Sunderland. Their design was 'the route of the torch' - a map of the whole country showing the route of the Olympic Torch.

A great many businesses also donated raffle and auction prizes so a big thank you to them all for their support of Children North East. I hope all the winners enjoy their prizes.

Lastly none of this could happen without a lot of hard work over many months. So thank you Carol Taylor, senior fundraiser at Children North East and the team - Eileen Botterill and our student Emma Patterson.