We have such a set pattern for our Eids: I cook in the morning, we get ready, we go to my mums for lunch, the whole family gather. We eat mum’s beautiful food, we joke and laugh, we exchange gifts and spent the afternoon taking photos, mostly of the gaggle of cheeky little girls we […]

With my older children away, I was expecting a quiet easy-going Eid with the Babies and a chance to just enjoy the moment.  With the house cleaned and organised, the menu planned, the food shopping done and a decision to wear what we already have rather than buy new clothes, Eid was looking good alhamdulillah. […]

My husband is away for dawah work again this month. For those who are regular readers of the blog, you will know that my husband goes out to preach through his masjid every year for forty days (through a group called Tablighi Jamaat).  It is something we believe in and value and has been a part […]

I have had some hard and very heartfelt conversations with my husband in recent times, about trying to do the right thing, trying to raise your children in what seems to be the right way and still seeming to get it wrong. Like the following: We have never had a TV, for reasons explained here. […]

Where’s Funky Monkey is a new book designed to encourage children to explore some of the most amazing places around the world. Destinations in the book include the Taj Mahal, the Great Barrier Reef, the Great Wall of China, the Pyramids of Giza and Machu Picchu in Peru. Readers have to look for Funky Monkey, […]

At the beginning of the children’s school holidays I came to the conclusion that the internet was having a negative affect on my children.  I could see it in the Kardashian culture seeping into my daughters thinking.  I could hear it in the language they were using.  It was becoming visible through their behaviour when […]

What passage or quote of the Quran makes you grateful? It’s difficult to choose, over time, different verses of the Quran have moved me or impacted me in different ways.  But just a few include: “For indeed, with hardship [will be] ease. Indeed, with hardship [will be] ease.” ~ Quran 94:5-6 There is so much […]

I really enjoyed making Eid decorations this year with my youngest two. The older ones have lost interest a little as they become teens, or so I thought until last Ramadan, when I decided to keep things simple and not to bother and my oldest asked hopefully if I would be putting Ramadan decorations up […]

I needed something easy to write about while I was feeling a little brain dead and stuck and this felt like an easy list to make. Forty of my favourite books by the age of forty. 1.     The Sealed Nectar by Sheikh Safi-ur-Rahman al-Mubarakpuri – an important and easy to read biography of the beloved […]

There are no words for what happened in Paris this weekend, I cannot imagine the terror those poor people went through.  I have been mulling over the attacks and the multiple responses the last 24 hours or so: the anger, the fear, those trying to rise above it and reach out on all sides.  I […]

I have long been attracted by minimalism. It is one of my life goals to give away what I have and have next to nothing by the time I die. A nice thought, but in reality I find myself collecting all sorts of things: gifts, stationary, jewellery, craft supplies. Five children bring their own wealth […]

I first wrote about Imran Khan in 2011, here, when I came across one of his speeches, unfortunately I can’t find it now, but it was unlike anything I had heard from a Pakistani politician and just blew me away.  I wrote again in 2013 of my disappointment when IK lost the elections in Pakistan, […]

One of the toughest aspects of modern life for Muslimah’s right now is marriage – or lack thereof.  I know so many sisters who are looking to marry and are struggling for so many reasons. We seem to be a generation caught between the old way of doing things where our parents found someone vaguely […]

I have been at my new job a week and a half and I am thoroughly enjoying it alhamdulillah.  The day goes by in a flash, I am learning so much and there is lots of opportunity to be creative and throw around ideas. One of the areas I am doing a lot of work […]