A Squash and a Squeeze: Sharing Stories with Julia Donaldson – A guest post by Lee Middleton

I would be willing to bet that the name Julia Donaldson is a familiar name to pretty much every house in the UK with children. If the authors name isn’t familiar then I would bet her books certainly are. How about Room on a Broom, The Snail & The Whale, Monkey Puzzle or what is undoubtedly her most famous creation, The Gruffalo. Just a small selection from a writing career that started all the way back in 1993 with A Squash and a Squeeze.

A Squash and a Squeeze was originally a song written by Donaldson for BBC childrens TV show Play School, it was then printed in book form and now it is the title of the Exhibition being held in the Gas Hall at the Birmingham Museum, sharing stories with Julia Donaldson. To say I was slightly excited when I heard about this exhibition would be an understatement! The Gruffalo (and child) have been favourites in our house for many years (my daughter is now 6) and led us onto so many other great books by Donaldson which have just been passed down the family to my son who is 2. What a great excuse for a fun and informative family outing.

As soon as you walk through the doors you enter a world of colour, It’s bright, it’s bold, its like stepping into a cartoon quite literally. For those with younger children in buggies the very helpful staff were very quick to point out where to park so the kids could explore. Pushchair out of the way and off we went!

As you make your way around you walk through individual areas dedicated to particular books. The walls themselves are adorned with characters and scenary from the book as well as displays or artwork, some of Donaldsons original notes and other memorabilia relating to the book you are walking past.

Each area also has a selection of the books themselves and foam furniture you can sit on and read, I certainly haven’t read all of the books on show and if you have the time and your kids have the patience you can quite literally read everything whilst you are there. The memorabilia on the walls offers a fascinating incite into how Donaldson comes up with her story ideas, the rhymes that have made her so famous, correspondence between author and illustrator, author and publisher and various other nic-nacs that any true fan would find interesting. This though is where I think the problem with this exhibition starts.

This is very much an exhibition targeted at children but in my own opinion there is not enough to keep the children occupied for long. The nature of her books attract a pre-school and early years audience and yet here we have an exhibition that has some fun stuff for the kids but if, like me, you are interested in the story behind the stories, it is very hard to balance that with keeping the kids entertained.

Lets take the very start of the exhibition, the Squash and a Squeeze area. There are 2 “houses” for the children to explore, 1 empty house and 1 house full of stuffed toys to represent the animals from the book. My 6 year old poked her head through the windows to see what was inside and my 2 year old walked in had a walk around, threw himself on top of the cuddly toys and walked back out again. Total entertainment for kids 30 seconds, in the meantime I was still looking at the first of many pieces on the wall.

Don’t get me wrong there ARE things for the littlies in each area but not a lot, there is the chance to sit on the tail of the whale and take a look at some sea creatures, there are a couple of building areas with lego blocks and stacking towers and who wouldn’t want to let their littlies dress up as some of the characters from the books? All good family fun but the balance just doesn’t seem quite right. My 2 year old played with everything for 30 seconds and my 6 year old was, and I quote “too big to do that kind of stuff daddy” but on the flipside was too young to really appreciate what was on the walls.

Don’t get me wrong it is a great exhibition but I cant help feeling that they could have done so much more with it for the kids, which lets face it is who the exhibition is surely all about? However saying that, Julia Donaldson remains a favourite in our household, now where did I put that Owl Ice Cream?

A Squash and a Squeeze: Sharing Stories with Julia Donaldson is exhibiting at The Gas Hall at Birmingham Museum until November 3^rd. 

• Full Price £6.50
• Child (3 – 16) £5.50
• Student £5.50
• Senior(60+) £5.50
• Family of 4 £20.00
• Income Support £2.00