Allah (swt) made us all

Asma doesn't stop to surprise us with the wonderful intelligence Allah (swt) has granted her at her young baby age. Truly, Allah (swt) is our Creator and bestows on us a natural yearning to follow Him.

Yesterday, Mamma was making tea in the kitchen. We do have now one of our uncles (Moin Chacha) living with us in a separate portion of our home, which we access through a separate door. When tea was ready, Mamma said: "Let's give tea to Moin Chacha." On hearing this, Asma disappeared from kitchen and came back carrying from room Mamma's big Chadar, which she uses for covering herself, when passing on something to Moin Chacha. We were so taken aback by her intelligence! Asma is just 1,7 yrs old but already has understood the basic guidelines Muslim ladies have for covering themselves. :)

Likewise, it is enough for us to say to Asma: "Let's pray," and she goes off bringing to us the prayer mats and the prayer clothes Mamma uses when she prays. Asma herself also loves to do her 'prayers' along with us, following us in every position as we do it. And very often, she loves to do some mischief as well - to disturb us in a thousand creative ways, when we do our prayers. :)

 

Karachi spring

One lazy afternoon, Uzair was complaining of nothing to do. So Mom decided to send him on a secret mission. She gave him a camera and told to go outside in our lane to take photos of all the spring flowers he manages to find. Here you can see what he came up with.

The solar system model

We really enjoyed reading "Space Explorers" book from "The Magic School Bus" series and learned a lot about the planets of the solar system. We made a project of our own solar system, as close in size and color to the actual planets as we could. This one in made by Hafsa.

The project: recyclable A4 paper mashed into balls and painted by water colours, cover of a pizza box.

The shoes age

Yep, Asma has reached "the shoes age" - that bugging curiosity of fitting her little feet into any shoes she spots around the home.

Little gardener

As Asma's getting more and more mobile, she's also becoming increasingly interested in plants and all other things out there behind the door of the home. Hafsa was spraying the leaves of plants in our car-porch - Asma insisted she needed to have a try of it.

Plague doctor project

As we were reading about the plague of the Middle Ages, which killed nearly a third of population in Europe, we did an art project. Medieval plague doctors used to wear these type of masks, believing that the masks would protect them from getting sick - how about that? At that time, they didn't know that the disease was being carried around by rats and transferred to humans by flees.

A Day in the Life of George

George came to us very unexpectedly - by accident actually - and we did not have a clue that he will share a day of his life with us.

We were sitting at the dining table and cutting bhindi (ladyfingers) with our Mom, when suddenly a strange looking bhindi turned up. It had a good-sized hole in the middle and right from that hole, a big green worm with black eyes was staring at us. It was so big that we thought it is filling up the entire bhindi! On seeing the worm, Hafsa asked, if she could keep it as a pet. And mom said: "Why not?"

Next, of course, we had to find a name for Hafsa's worm. Since it was green in colour, it was agreed that the name should start with "G". "Greenie" would be silly, "Georgina" sounded too long - so we finally arrived at "George", which became the name our worm got. 

Now Hafsa had to decide, where to keep George and its bhindi. The best option she thought of was to put it in a plant's pot in our carporch. So she did, and we forgot about George for a while, happy that it didn't get fried along with bhindi but found a nice new home instead.

Later the same day, Mom heard Uzair yelling from the carporch, where he was playing cricket with his friend Misbah: "Mamma, Hafsa, come, come quiclkly - George is on my wicket!!!" And indeed he was. George had climed out of the plant's pot, where Hafsa had placed him, and was on a run. But why? Hafsa looked at the cosy bhindi-home George had left behind and was shocked to discover that it was all covered with ants! So that's why George was on the run. This brought back to our mind the "Insect Invaders" book of "Magic School Bus" series, which we read a couple weeks ago - ants can and do eat worms, if they get a chance at it. Many of them pile over the worm and inject into it their venom, which paralizes the worm. Hence, our George was fortunate enough to escape a sure death.

Hafsa once again picked up George and this time put it outside the gate - in the soil of motia bush. And that's the last we saw of George. We wish all the best for George, thank it for the lessons it taught us and hope it is still alive today.  

Asma is walking

After quite a few months spent on all four, Asma finally has decided to start on two. We've been enjoying her crawling around the home a lot, as Uzair and Hafsa did not crawl at all. Here we see, what difference a walker makes for a child: Uzair and Hafsa were using a walker, did not crawl at all and learned to walk just before they turned one year. Asma has never been in walker. She crawled for good five months and now, at her 14 months of age, is making her first independent attempts at walking. Well, I guess the natural way of doing things is good for the child, as s/he can get started on every new task whenver s/he is ready for it, Alhamdulillah.

Mewing visitor

One nice March afternoon, we heard lots and lots of mewing in the carporch. Upon inspecting the case, Uzair reported that a kitten is there... and it looks very hungry. He asked, if we could give it some milk and so we did. Kitty could not finish the whole plate so we put it also for its mom, who was looking for it just outside the gate.

Real viking ships

As we studied in our history book about the time the vikings sailed the seas, we made a project of our very own 'real' viking ships!

Update on the onion business

Here comes the update on our "onion business". Within a matter of a few days, by daily changing the water of the onion and putting it for some sunlight, Hafsa's onion had grown to a wonderfully amazing size, as you can see in the pictures below. The little dish of water was full of strong roots. On the other hand, Uzair's onion, which we planted in soil, did not strive so well at all and... eventually died... Our guess is that the soil we planted it in was poor in nutrients, so the onion could not get enough strenth from it, even though we watered it every day.

Hafsa "harvested" her green onions and cut them all by herself for a salad (along with other yummy veggies), which she proudly presented for Abba at dinner time.

However, the onion story does not end here. After cutting off the green onions, we still left Hafsa's onion in the same water over night. And guess what happened? By next morning, to our great surprise, it had grown half an inch again! So we kept it in water for some more time and witnessed the wonders of Allah - the green onion just kept on growing. :)

Onion 'business'

When Abba brought vegetables from the market this Sunday, we found in the batch of onions two heads with ‘green hair’ sprouting out on top. We realized it’s that time of the year again, when we can try to grow our own green onions. We cut off two bottoms of plastic bottles, poured in a little water (about 1,5 cm) and put our onions inside. Within a couple days, the green ‘hair’ stretched longer and some beautiful white roots appeared on the bottoms of our onions. Then, Uzair got a new idea – he wanted to plant his onion in soil, which is what we did. We got a pot, made the soil soft, watered it, dig a hole in the middle, placed onion inside with roots down and gently covered it with soil. Now, please, make Dua together with us that Uzair’s onion grows and multiplies into a good harvest. :) We’ll keep you updated about it, insha’Allah.

Pakistan Air Force museum

We had a really great visit to Pakistan Air Force museum with our friends from Bookworms Book Club! So many planes to see, so much space to run and even rides to enjoy! All the photos from our trip you can see here.

No wood carpentry

Don't trow away in garbage that fridge packing, after it gets delivered to your house! With some tips from Uzair, it can become a great resource for unleashing your creativity. First of all, all kids love boxes - to climb inside them, make a secret hiding place, invite friends for a party... etc., etc. Second - that white puffy stuff also can be put to great use. Uzair took a saw, hammer and some old nails and screws (which he used as nails as well) and made quite many great playthings! Who said that carpentry work cannot be done without wood? Enjoy the pictures and think of your own ideas. :)

Axes of ancient celts

As we were studying about the ancient Celtic warriors, our history book offered us a great craft – to make our own versions of the axes the warriors were using for fighting in those times. So we did – and they came out pretty good. When the lesson and activity were done, Uzair and Hafsa put their new axes to use – in drawing room, they created their own version of a war-field with different obstacles to tackle and put up a real war scene.