After relaxing on the first day of Eid, we decided that the next day we would invite guests to ours. With this in mind, the cooking began nice and early with the two of us (I and hubby) going as quick as we could. There was rice with peas, chicken curry, haleem and kheer (rice […]
Lulworth seemed like a good place to stop in Dorset. On arriving though, although I found the town picturesque, the cove felt like a bit of a let down: smaller than imagined, no boats around (probably too choppy) and not much to do. The walk to nearby Durdle Door, the famous rock formation in the […]
Last Friday Friends of Al-Aqsa launched their Check the Label – Boycott Israeli Dates 2014 campaign. I’m a little late, but with Ramadan less than three weeks away, I thought it would still be timely to mention the campaign. image source It seems to me that as consumers Muslim’s in this country do have some power to […]
I got a phone call from my middle child’s school this week asking me to come in. I asked what it was about and they said not to worry. For a brief moment I did entertain delusions about being called in for a good reason, such as he being recognised as some kind of child […]
We were taught this song at school as nine-year olds, and the images the words create were so powerful at that time that they have always stayed with me. At the time the poem reminded me of East London and Green Street Market which was frequented by my mum. I love London and it’s an […]
This is my fruit-tree collection. I have been sticking fruit stones into pots on my window-sill not really thinking they would grow. So far I have an avocado plant and a lychee which is very pretty. My pride and joy though is my little ajwa plant. Ajwa is a very special kind of date and […]
Little Man is due to start High School this September. I am amazed at how this milestone in his life has come around already and I have also been a little worried about how he is going to manage. Little Lady was always tough and vocal. Gorgeous is big and loud – everyone knows if […]
We have been hearing about the frightening situation of the Rohingya people of Myanmar over the last two years or more, over 146,000 children, women and men have been forced to flee to Bangladesh to escape violence since August 2017, but until recently it has seemed that the ethnic cleansing of these people has been ignored […]
Today is the children’s last day at school before the summer holidays start. I made the cards below to thank the teachers for all of the hard work they have put into teaching my children this year and also because they take care of them all day every day for us and keep them safe and occupied. We have […]
We are now well into the third lockdown in London and the second stint of home-schooling. I remember how relieved I was when the children went back to school, thinking to myself: “I am never doing this again”, only to find myself there again less than six months later: Home schooling five children Navigating GCSE’s, […]
It’s just over a month at my new job and I am still enjoying myself. I have been meeting community groups, brainstorming ways to celebrate diversity, learning about community cohesion, writing a guide to prayer room usage, updating internet pages and generally doing what my geeky self considers fun. The people I work with are […]
Did I have a crappy day or what today? Forgetting my work shoes, skidding all over the ice, having the busses cancelled on the way home because the main road near my house was closed off (making me panic thinking about why). I had three lots of guests (various friends of hubby dropping by). Dinner […]
My mum and dad recently spent a month in Pakistan catching up with family and old friends and enjoying a change from every day life. Mum has lovely taste and loves shopping and came back with a stylish new wardrobe for herself. She also made the effort to find or have made a gift for […]
If you’ve been following the news around the Trojan Horse Plot news story about Muslims in Birmingham trying to take over state schools (read more here, here, here, here and here), two things caught my eye this morning that might interest you. The first is a letter from Michael Rosen, who is an wonderful children’s poet and writer […]
