Friday, May 27, 2011

bismillah,

only a week after touchdown, I wanted to sleepover at my naqibah's house(shared with many other sisters). So in order to make my mum pleased, I tidied the whole house to an extreme, did everything I can so that she can not complain one single thing, and will be pleased with me, hence getting Allah's redha.

That was the sole intention.

I left the house, feeling proud of myself. 

Only to receive a call from her just a few hours after that, saying she was very upset with me for I didn't take out coconut milk that she wanted to use (I wasn't told to).

Yes I know, it is the intention, and the effort that matter. But I was very disappointed, and I talked to her about it a few days after that, when she was in a good mood. 

You know what did she say about it? "Oh I'm preparing you for your mother in law".

I couldn't help but laugh. Sigh. 

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

bismillah,

whenever i talk abt him to ppl, i would always describe him as someone who is very quiet and distant from the family. dont get me wrong. we were very close. extremely close. until one day he went to boarding school and came back as a man, and no longer a boy. that changed everything.

so that was what i think of him, until recently. i just realized, he does make effort to be a dear brother to me. it is me, who distanced myself away from him.

whenever he says something to me, it is me who doesnt reply, merely because i do not know what to say. and the jokes he makes, go by without me laughing at them.

however, i seriously do not remember the last time he was this nice to me. dear sel, do not ruin things.

oh Allah, thank you for this opportunity. i do love him sincerely for the sake of Allah. please please make us go to jannah together.

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

alhamdulillah, thummalhamdulillah!

kids' ability to memorize amazes me! maryam, kid #2 memorized a surah within 5 days!Allahuakbar. well, it is not truly an achievement, but do consider that this is my first trial. plus, we didn't really do anything intensive. it was merely a 5-10 minutes reading per day, and sometimes the sessions don't even last that long. and on certain days, it is just me reciting the surah to her repeatedly, and her repeating it after me while she plays or does something else.


i started the same way i did with muzakkir. i recited the quran in front of her, and invited her to join in. i tested her on some surahs, to see how far she has memorized. i wanted her to continue from there, but she insisted on wanting to memorize ad-dhuha.

i agreed, and we went from there.

everytime we read, i would correct her mahkraj and tajwid, as she can already read with tartil, alhamdulillah. i try to make her start our sessions with alfatihah everytime, so that she can perfect the tajwid of that surah, in order to perform her daily prayers better. not that she prays much. oh my. that's another issue i have to try to tackle.
bismillah,

okay, this is a longgggg due update. shall i start from day 1?

kids are hard to deal with. you miss them when you are far away, but you get really annoyed when they pester you 24/7. or, when they don't listen to you.

day 1 was alhamdulillah, fun. but i didn't start anything until day 2. i woke up early, probably due to jet lag. at around 5, i heard someone using the bathroom. it turned out to be muzakkir, kid #1. when fajr came, i asked him to pray with me. to encourage him, i told him to be the imam and i pretended to follow him.

nothing has changed in his reading from the last time i left him. after prayers, i read quran outloud in front of him, to make him used to it. he was then eager to join me.

he still doesnt know how to read the quran, eventhough he does memorize short surahs. which was a hugeee shock for me. i really didn't know he still can't read. so i asked him to only read alfatihah (by memory), while i point the script accordingly to him. he mispronounce many words, but that is okay, since he doesnt fully speak yet. so i corrected some pronunciations(not even makhrajs or tajwid, just trying to get the correct english-letters-sound out of him).

and even for the days after that, these were the only things i did with him. read quran aloud in front him to get him to join me, asks him to read alfatihah by memory while i point, and correct his pronunciation.

anyways, my short experience with him shows that yes, it is true that we can teach kids to memorize quran even before they speak properly, and even before they could read the quran. well, many kids memorize alfatihah and annas before they could even read right? or atleast the du'a before eating.

those simple prayers that kids memorize, aren't they in arabic too?so don't wait for your kids to be able to read to only then teach them hifzulquran.

wallahua'lam,
ummu ibrahim...