blackberry upside down cake

everyone is talking about preserving and canning and freezing, this is all new to me as i haven't really done anything like that before and it seems a little too late to start this year, but when i came across these little beauties although i knew i couldn't can, freeze or preserve i knew there was something else that i could do, make blackberry upside down cake

it was half gone by the time i came to take pictures, typical!

with ice cream, yummy!

space hop

our summer reading challenge is going really well, books are being read, reviews are being written (or drawn) in some cases, stickers and prizes are being collected, i'm really proud of my son mashallah, he has really developed in his reading over the last few weeks and has already read four of the six books for the challenge, my daughter on the other hand hasn't been so motivated, she got her first lot of stickers and a pencil for completing the first two books but left them in the library, she is now looking forward to the next lot of stickers mashallah

Ramadan

alahmdulillah, the wait is over and ramadan has finally arrived, we have unplugged (the tv) for the month (islamic programmes aside), so the kids have loads more time to do useful things mashallah, its nice watching them finding things to do while they are not watching tv. our days are filled with quran recitation and memorisation, reading islamic stories together, i have been setting the kids activities to do, such as designing a ramadan poster, writing a ramadan poem, but the best thing has been watching my son waiting all day to open the envelope of the calender which we made. all day he will be back and forth touching, pressing, feeling, to see what could possibly be inside, and then seeing his face when finally after iftar when we open it, it's definitely teaching him sabr (patience) mashallah.

another thing we are doing is putting money in our zakah jar on a daily basis, my daughter has happily donated five pounds (which is a lot for her) of her money alhamdulillah

have a blessed and fruitful ramadan everyone

Ramadan Kareem

may everyones prayers get answered this ramadan inshallah

ramadan preperation

we finished making our ramadan advent calender today, alhamdulillah it turned out really nice. i made it by sticking 30 small envelopes, 15 on each side of a piece of card. the enveloped were decorated by the kids. now all i have to do is fill it up!

ramadan/eid preperation

after reading a few sisters' blogs and how they prepare, plan and organise themselves before ramadan was very inspirational, so i decided that i would try to get a little organised myself this year. so for the last week i have been cleaning, organising, tidying, sorting absolutely everything. we've also started preparing food that we can freeze and store for the coming month and eid inshallah. these are traditional snacks made from rice flour.

the hard work will definately be worth it as we will have much more time to concentrate on the more important things.

sports day

we had sports day today with our home ed group it was a great day full of laughter, joy, excitement, disappointment (when children lost a race), determination, but most of all FUN! the sun shined (once or twice) but that didn't dampen any one's eagerness, well done to the sister who conducted all the challenges on the day, what she did took a lot of patience. my pictures are not great (it's quite hard taking pictures of little people who are continuously on the go). all children were given sweets after they finished a race, my children have never had that many sweets in one day (i think that means that regardless of whether they won or lost, the kids were very happy), we should give apples and pears out next year inshallah. another successful day alhamdulillah

p.s we missed you umm anas!

beside the seaside

i often imagine that i had a little cottage, my backyard would be a beautiful sandy beach, i would have chickens and my kids could run around freely without a care in the world. there is something special about being near the ocean, the sounds and smells, it really reminds me that there is someone greater and more magnificient, the creator.