Stories from the Playgrounds

E4C’s Summer Snack Program has wrapped up for the summer and now that school will be back in session, E4C’s School Lunch Program will begin. Here were a few stories collected from the playgrounds the Summer Snack Program visits. (Stories collected by Jessica and Grace, who delivered the snack throughout the summer.)

Lorelei Beaumaris Playground

Lorelei Beaumaris  always had the most polite and quiet kids. Everyday when I would arrive they would smile and act very gracious and excited to receive their snack. They never cared about what  snack they were receiving – least picky eaters around. These kids just loved that there was something new and healthy to eat. The highlight for me was when the Rec Tech told me that the kids all thought it was just magical how all this snack came every day and decided that although they all knew who I was, and what my name was, they felt it was much more fitting to call me the snack fairy. From that point on, for the majority of the summer I would arrive and they would all come over to me and say “thank you snack fairy!”

Caernarvon Playground

Caernarvon was entertaining. Every single day snack would arrive at the same time (and for the most part it was consistent which kids were at the park) and every single day as soon as they saw me they would run around and scream and run to go wash there hands because they knew snack time had arrived. One boy wanted bagels all summer. He would ask all the time if it was bagel day. I shared this with the kitchen assistant so we managed to provide bagels as part of the snack one day. He was over the moon with excitement and I told him thanks to him he got bagels for ALL of the parks on that day. He was impressed and surprised with himself. It was very cute to see his expression.

Calder Playground

This park I really felt the need for snack. As soon as I would pull up they would heard around cooler of snack and just hover until it was all handed out. Even on rainy days it was the only park that still had a lot of kids come out. Many of the kids would not even spend a lot of time at the Greenshack they would just show up because they were hungry and knew they would be able to eat.

Mother Teresa Playground

On a rainy day to Mother Teresa, one of the boys had come over to the van to protect me from the rain. I thought it was very sweet of him and thanked him for it. But little did I know… He said me “no, I just didn’t want my snack to get wet”. It was very funny to see how much he loved his snack at the park.

These generous sponsors and supporters make the Summer Snack Program possible:

Alberta Blue Cross – Hearts of Blue

Edmonton’s Food Bank

GEM Catering – Covenant Health

ISL Engineering

Rotary Club of Edmonton Northeast

Sobeys

United Way of the Alberta Capital Region

and our many Volunteers!