Hayati Kullu Ha Lillah

Our children are learning this nasheed below so that they can understand a bit more Arabic. I am also learning the song with them. I hope very soon we will be able to sing the song on our own, bi'idnillah.
You can listen to the nasheed here. 

حياتى كلها لله .. فلا مولى لنا الاه 
My life is all for Allah...for there is no Lord but Him
احب الله جل علاه .. ومن حبى له اخشاه 
I love Allah, and from this love I humble myself
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اصون النفس احميها .. بنور الله اهديها 
I protect the 'self' and look after it, with God's light I guide it
بحب الله اسقيها .. لتفرح عندما تلقاه 
With the love of God I water it, so that when it can be joyful upon meeting Him
حياتى كلها لله .. حياتى كلها لله 
My life is all for Allah
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اذا ما الحب لم يسبى .. فؤاد المؤمن الصب
If love didnt fill the believers heart
فوا اسفاه على القلب .. لان الزيف قد غشاه 
Then pity the heart, because glitter has fooled him
حياتى كلها لله .. حياتى كلها لله 
My life is all for Allah
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يقيني بين جنبيا .. واسعى بالهدى سعيا
My conviction is with me, and I look for guidance 
كفانى اننى احيا .. وامضى فى سبيل الله 
It is enough that I am alive and living for the sake of God
حياتى كلها لله .. حياتى كلها لله 
My life is all for Allah
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اذا جادت ليا الدنيا ... واسقتنى المنى ريا
If life tempted me 
ستبقى بين كفيا .. ويبقى خافقى لله
It will stay between my hands, and my beats for Him 
حياتى كلها لله .. حياتى كلها لله
My life is all for Allah

Trip to Regents Park masjid (mosque)

Alhamdulillah this Friday I went to Regents Park masjid to meet my friend Aisha. We talked about my Arabic study. I am really glad to know that I am actually doing good alhamdulillah. Her remarks made my day, alhamdulillah! I think learning a language is difficult but with determination and the support of friends and family, the path to learning gets easier. InshAllah from next week, we will study the Qur'an with the tafseer (explanations). I really don't want to master Arabic grammar for the sake of grammar itself. I find grammar quite dry. I do feel that now a days, when I read Qur'an, it's more about finding out what sort of sentence a sentence is, finding subjects, objects, predicates, participles etc. I really want to concentrate on the spiritual aspects of the Qur'an. At the end of the day, I want to understand the Qur'an to boost my imaan and connect to my Creator, Allah subhana wa ta'ala. I also want to teach my children the Qur'an myself. I am hoping this Ramadan will be an amazing Ramadan for me, given I am learning the Qur'anic Arabic, bi'idnillah.

I bought couple of books from the bookshop at the mosque. For myself, I bought Tafsir Al-Qurtubi: Classical commentary of the Holy Qur'an Volume 1 Translated by Aisha Bewley. It got 787 pages so quite a mammoth task for me to complete. The book covers the tafseer of Surah al-Baqara! This surah is the biggest surah (chapter) of Qur'an. I really love the way every verse has been explained. I hope I will benefit a lot from this book, bi'idnillah. It cost me £40 but I think the price is nothing in comparison to what I will be learning from this huge book, bi'idnillah. I will be sharing the gems through my blog inshAllah. Please do share your comments if you have read the book.

I bought some books for my kids as they have been demanding prophets stories for a long time. As I am a lazy mum, I just do the stories from my head during bedtime. But they really want to learn more. Imran is 5 now and Ayesha is 4 and both of them are quite avid listeners mashAllah. So to quench their thirst, I bought some books on stories of the prophets. InshAllah I hope to talk about them in future posts.

We had lunch at the masjid canteen. We had palau rice, kebabs and spinach cooked with potatoes. I had spinach with chicken before but never had it with potatoes. It was yummy. I will give a try soon inshAllah.
Aisha had to leave so I went to the basement to pray zuhr. I met one of the very special aunt from hajj time. I went to hajj in January 2006 with my dad. Alhamdulillah I met the aunt there. She is originally from India. She was quite old but she used to help others a lot. We had hundred and six people in our hajj group. Usually around lunch and dinner time, we the young ones from the group, would help serving the food. But aunt used to help us too, mashAllah. I was so glad to see her. MashAllah she is an inspiration. I hope if I am alive when I am old, I can be like her, always in service of others, bi'idnillah.

Alhamdulillah, there was another very generous lady in the masjid, who gave Yusuf a love toy car as a gift. I feel really touched when I receive a gift from a complete stranger. May Allah subhana wa ta'ala reward her for her generosity, ameen! She was busy reciting the Qur'an. I am glad that Yusuf (2) had a good time. I want to take my children to the masjid on a regular basis. I want them to love going to masjid.

Unfortunately our trips to the masjids haven't been all that rosy. Sometimes we get some aunts, especially recruited by the mosque authorities (So that parents can think twice before bringing their kids again to the mosque) , who keep complaining about the children ( for children behaving as children!) and staring at their poor (already quite stressed-out) mothers. Sometimes, I get really annoyed and frustrated. Most of the masjids don't really have any facilities for the children. No wonder, most of the kids don't really look forward to go to the mosque. InshAllah when I become a millionaire, I want to open a very family-friendly mosque just like the mosque of our beloved prophet Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa sallam. We talk about raising our kids as good Muslims, but if we don't provide them with proper  environment, how on earth we can achieve this goal! May Allah subhana wa ta'ala give us the ability to understand His deen and follow His Guidance with sincerity, ameen!

I found this site New Muslim Kids while searching for an image of children and masjid. MashAllah they have some lovely collection of images to colour in. Do have a look inshAllah . My children will like colouring them, inshAllah.