Sorting and Organising Toys

Asalam alaikum,

Earlier this year I had a nasty case of coughing for well over 3 weeks which left my ribs and back in a battered state, despite physiotheraphy it was a very difficult struggle. 

Alhamdulilah for recovering and duas for other sisters who are still suffering from this epidemic which seems to have crossed all over Sydney. I was buying Internet and the Phillipines call centre worker seemed to be suffering from it too, wonder how it got to there subhanallah. I think it is whooping cough. 

I needed to find a solution so that I didn't need to be picking up toys from all over the house. Littlest munchkin was 11 months then and all the toys grew legs. 

Any requests for help from the other children were met with so many little voices whinging, with mysterious little lungs having coughing attacks right at that very moment. 

I know this happens in every house. But I wasn't to be a statistic. 

All the toys are now in the garage. In a big plastic box. Next to the red back spiders. *Hmph*.

Here is a picture of our little poisonous toy guards. 

So now I have (and will inshallah since there actually spiders there today, and I'm arachnophobic myself) organise the toys into the following categories and only two boxes can come out at one time (inshallah):

Plastic blocks

Wooden blocks

Tea Sets

Beauty/Dress Up toys

Animals figures

Cars

Indoor sports 

Fiddly toys (yoyos, spinning toys)

Toolbox toys

The boxes I am using to sort the toys were marketed as shoeboxes found at the Reject Shop at $10 for three. I really liked these boxes because their size was great for storage, they are transparent and look neat when stacked. I have put my children's baby memorabilia in others I bought too. 

Take care sisters,

Do share with me how you store your children's toys.

Umm Musk

ICO Network Arabic Textbooks and Islamic Studies Textbooks

Asalam alaikum

I am really happy to have found the ICO Network website. Inshallah you will find this a really useful website to aid your child's journey in learning Islamic Studies and Arabic Studies.

The materials published by ICO are of the highest quality. They have demonstrated excellence in their endeavour to deliver high standard, engaging books and textbooks that aim to teach children Islam and Arabic.

My daughter's islamic school uses these text books as part of its curriculum for Islamic and Arabic Studies. I'm sure those mothers who are homeschooling have been searching for a professional set of textbooks for their children. These mothers as well as those whose children are unable to access an islamic school would be very interested in these texts. 

I definately recommend this publisher's works. I like the way the same characters are used throughout the curriculum, it is comforting for children to see Lulu, Yara, Wassim and Shadi crop up in different books and settings. Children find the lively drawings, colours and layout of the pages very engaging. 

The use of creative graphic design and fonts are also aesthetically pleasing. There has been a great deal of child psychology and teaching studies that have gone on in the production of these materials. 

One of the major, very major problems with the texts however is that the text is completely in Arabic. From the title to the end notes. So for those ajami (non-arabic) mums and teachers these books present a hurdle that needs to be overcome. For those who can afford a tutor or an arabic friend to help out with the translation then these books are very beneficial. For those who can not then the books still provide a great of help, especially for writing and recognition of letters and word formation. What the teacher would do at my daughter's school would be to print out a list of instructions with page numbers and fill out a table with translations for that particular unit of the week. 

There is also another website called the First Education website which is listed with the ICO Network's website but I though I'd share it here again. This website is the distributor in the UK. Though I haven't used it I'm sure inshallah it will work for Australia. 

ICO Network website: http://iconetwork.com/

First Education website: http://first-education.co.uk/


I pray that this post is beneficial to sisters and brothers

Asalam alaikum

Umm Musk 

Contact Film and Leather Activity

Engaging with our children in fun Halal activities is a great way to strengthen our bond with them. Inshallah :)

Asalamalaikum,

I love colours, feathers and a good activity the children can do by themselves. This one is perfect for all these categories. Inshallah this helps sisters looking for ways to squeeze in some extra chores or ibadah.  

Getting children to create amazing art with colourful dyed feathers by sticking them onto contact paper proved out to be very fun and very pretty.

I've found it especially hard to get my 2 year old doing activities that require minimal supervision. Everything arty seems to need alot of attention and equate to cleaning up a big mess at the end. Whoever has stepped away from a toddler art table for even 2 seconds knows what I mean. (My previous house had white carpets, they were not as white when we moved out),

I love the fact that I don't have to help little BabyGirl2 with glue, tape or peeling sticker backing. There were just feathers to sweep up when they finished making this my favorite activity.  

All that is required is a sheet of contact paper, non-sticky side stuck against the wall or fridge with tape and off they go sticking away.

I used a yellow contact film (I couldn't seem to find it anywhere except at Big W and except in yellow) and the feathers were from the art section from an asian dollar store.

You can substitute feathers with pom poms, pipe cleaners, felt, streamers, cut out shapes and so much more.



Asalam alaikum :)

Umm Musk

Junk Mail Crafts - Healthy Eating Collage

Some of the most fun arts and crafts can be created with things that are lying around right under our noses. We made use of junk mail this morning but cutting it up and creating pages of health posters. 

Junk mail is fun to look at but a chore to dispose of. There's nothing that I see more messy in my house than a pile of scrumpled, overly colourful, glossy pages of ads. So it was great to cut it up into tiny pieces and make good use of it. It was great because I didn't have to print anything out or sift through my arts and crafts boxes to find suitable materials. It was less stressful art time since I did not to have to plan anything out in advance. 

I've been trying to get healthier with my children so we made health posters about what junk food is and what healthy food is. Both Baby Boy 1 now 3 years old and Baby Girl 2, now 2 years old found it exciting to recognise and lable household items whilst going through the grocery ads. They identified junk and health quite well which surprised me since I didn't think 2 years could tell coke has absolutely no nutritional value. Subhanallah. 

We made a page of junk food and a page of healthy food. We practiced learning the names of things in both english and in arabic too since that's the language we're trying to learn right now. We found tamar and burtuqaali and that's about how far my fruit vocab goes for now - dates and oranges! 

Woolworths has a Jamie's Garden promotion going on right now which I found very useful sincethe pictures of fruit were so cute. We've been collecting a few of those garden stickers too.

Lessons learnt: Labelling, language skills, knowledge of health issues, fine motor skills through using scissors.


Umm Musk :)

Bop Along Buddies Review

Asalamalaikum :)

Alhamdulilah Hubby ordered a surprise Bop Along Buddy for us :)

It was great timing as I have been trying to set up activities that will help my children adopt a healthier and more active lifestyle, however a tiny paved backyard hasn't allowed for that mission to be too successful. Going to the local park everyday for sporting activities in this chilly winter doesn't seem as appealing as it did in summer.

Alhamdulilah for the Bop Along Buddy, the kids have been bopping around all over the house. The ball bouncer had been lying around the house for a while and had lost it's initial novelty (as toys do...). It seems we've found an excellent alternative for it!

My children are aged between 5 and 2 and this seems to be the perfect age bracket for it. It is best loved by my 2 year old, suited for her height and weight. Kids up to 7 years should be fine using it, kids under 2 will need supervision as the children do fall off it. Its bopping design means that it isn't as stable so the child must support it with their own weight and hands.

Hubby bought Darcy the Dragon. It is a cute and fun bouncing invention made of durable PVC, easy to clean and okay for storing. I just have to make sure to keep it out of the praying area since it is an animal shape with a face.

The box included a pump and inflating it was pretty easy. Care needs to be taken to ensure it isn't over or under inflated.

My children love their Bop Along Buddy and I love it too as it has sorted out our winter exercise regime :)




Umm Musk :)