and we’re spening the day, cleaning and washing clothes and getting all those other boring house chores out of the way before spending Friday and Saturday at the in-laws house insha’allah.

The fasting in our house were up early for suhoor, befire going off to school…the joys of algerian milk and khobz khameer (supplied by my mother-in law)..but maybe not at 5.o.clock in the morning! Come to think of it there’s not much joy in Algerian milk at anytime of the day!! It come’s sacheted and uniquely tasting..the days of enjoying a refreshing glass of ice cold cows milk are long gone!!

the rest of the day is designated for cooking for some fasting brothers in the masjid and freezing a large quantity of fresh peas dh found in the market yesterday and some fresh Garnina, and I have no idea what it might be called ouside of DZ, but it’s delicious masha’allah…we’re trying to preserve as much of what we find in the market by freezing and hopefully pickling if I can find some decent jars…I can’t tell you how joyous the moment was yesterday when dh asked if I wanted the frsh peas he’d found in the market!!
Want them?? WANT THEM??? of COURSE I want them!!!!

anyway
Eidkum mubarak in advance, we will be away and I’m not sure when we will have internet access again, but we will take pictures of our eid to share with you when we get back insha’allah
xxx

It’s comfortingly cold here in Algeria now, tea drinking weather. And this week has seen us downloading patterns for winter woolens to keep us warm through the Algerian winter. I even brought knitting needles out of hibernation this week and started on a pair of  handwarmers for dd9!

Life here is rolling on in it’s reletless fashion, life is alot busier now that the children are all at school and coming and going at various times of the day. And the day starts alot earlier for us now, up at 5.30am in enough time to wake those going out to the masjid and for those at home to pray and prepare a nice warm breakfast for when they return and to warm them up before they have to go off to school. School starts at 8am, and mine are fortunate enough to attend schools just across the road from us, so it’s out of the door at 7.50 and for the women, it’s time to tackle the daily chores which involve lots of sweeping, dusting and quite a few buckets of water in an attempt to eradicate the ever present and prolific Algerian dust. Time then for a quick cuppa before thinking about lunch and getting a nice warm meal ready for when the children get back at 12pm. One of the hardest things for us to get used to schoolwise at first was the school week running from Sunday to Thursday which really disoriented us for a while but which has just become another regular part of living in DZ. Back to school then for the children at 1.20 and for us girls, after salat it’s either siesta time, reading, crafting or catching up with studies, at any rate it’s a chance to unwind for a while before having the children come back in time for afternoon tea and the joys of homework!.  some of the children have commitments at the masjid in the evening and dd9 has a tutor she visits several times a week, so during the school week time is very much spent making sure they get to where they have to be on time and making sure they’ve had a hot meal or a snack inside them before they go, which means in turn we’ve had to be far more on the ball about cooking and making sure mealtimes happen when they should than we ever had to be when we were homeschooling! 

Because our day starts alot earlier now, it ends alot earlier too, and the long nights of insomnia for me, if not completely cured have become less frequent and less imposing, which is one of the good by-products of living in Algeria.

All in all we are more than happy here, alot happier than we were during our last year in the UK, and for us it’s been the best thing we could have done. For sure life here isn’t easy, anyone living here will tell you that, but for us at least it’s become a more rewarding way of life. For the children and dh, life now revolves around the masjid, and knowing that my children have access to it five times  day and knowing that they are being nurtured there by brothers who are striving to raise a vibrant and Allah conscious youth has been one of the most uplifting things about moving here masha’allah. 

We now have sporadic internet usage, via a modem on loan to us which has been good…giving us just enough internet time to catch up with emails and blogging and not too much for us to abuse it and allow it to eat into our day. Having said that we’re working on getting some internet access of our own, but by then we’re hoping we’ll be a bit more grown up and less adolescent in our use of it!

And now off for one of those body warming cups of tea, because although the sky from my window looks clear and blue, there is a definite chill in the air this morning, and then to think about what goodies to make for afternoon tea, perhaps some flapjack and beghrir?

I’m not sure when my next bout of blogging will be, but I don’t think i’ll be aiming for anything more than a healthily long weekly update for a while…I’m working on trying to get some pics up too but I’m having trouble trying to get my camera to connect to my laptop, so it’s going to take me a while longer to sort that one out I think…

Until then, have a happy and fulfilling day wherever and however you may be spending it…

xxx

another brief and pictureless update…. we now have our computers with us at last, but are still waiting for some internet access….we’re getting used to the amount of time it takes to get things done here but it’s going to be frustrating for a wee bit longer for those who are waiting for us to keep in contact with a bit more frequency.

Apart from that life is rolling on quite nicely masha’allah…we have the odd frustration with psychotic teachers who’s prime role in life appears to be the ritual humiliation of the children left in their care, but it all keeps life interesting!

Now that the rest of our belongings have arrived from the UK, crafting can begin again insha’allah…our material stash arrived with the sewing machine, and we’ve been dreaming of a time in between the haphazzard and unpredictable school schedule when we can set it free from it’s shackles and go wild with it…

Just as an end note….I’d like to say sorry to anyone I haven’t had a chance to return comments to… all of your wonderful comments have been much appreciated since we’ve been here …and to my sister bloggers..whom I haven’t had time to read in ages….I’m missing you all SO much now it’s crazy…but insha’allah I’ll catch up with all your goings on soon…

xxx

we are now living in our own little flat masha’allah which we’re renting while we take our time to find something a bit more permanent…and life is beginning to move in a different rhythmn masha’allah….a day punctuated by the adhan is something altogether different and more inspiring..Life has indeed changed for us and we are all feeling alot happier and much more content masha’allah.. We have no internet as yet but life is busy and we’re not missing it too much yet..insha’allah we should have a connection up and running eventually, but things here take time…alot of time!, so we’ll have to be patient a while longer insha’allah. Ramadhan is upon us again…so for all who are fasting, may allah ta’ala accept it from you and make it a source of reward for you all in the dunya and the akhira ameen…..

xxx

we are here….it’s taken us a long time..but at last we are in  Algiers

Alhamdulillah Allah is indeed most merciful and had bless our moderate impatience with the Hijrah that we’ve been longing for…

We arrived two weeks ago, and are staying with my in-laws until we find something a little bit more permanent for ourselves, the living arrangements are a bit challenging and take an im-moderate amount of patience to deal with sometimes but the important thing is that we are finally able to start again and give our children the kind of freedom that they weren’t able to have back in the UK.

We’re cut off without landline or internet connection where we are…which hopefully will be sorted when we move somewhere more permanent, we jokingly refer to the place where my in-laws live as the black hole of Algiers..

I’m slowly but surely beginning to catch up with sisters I haven’t seen for far too long, and just generally adjusting to a new life full of new possibilities insha’allah..we’re taking lots of pictures which we’ll try and upload sometime, and dh and boys are spending plenty of time in the masjid nasha’allah…I can’t tell you  how nice it is to hear the adhan five times a day, and to see so many borthers in Qamees and sisters in Jilbabs..there is of course the same kind of lean towards fashion and commercialism that reigns supreme in the west..but this time round theres something that just feels so right about being here…this time round it feels like home

and we might be in Algeria…. nothing more to be said onthe hijrah front as yet..packing continues….there is a family visit..us to them..next week insha’allah and also the promise of some tea and cake eating with my lovely sisters this week and hopefully next insha’allah …so after a pretty dismal start to the year..we seem to be heading towards the ease after the hardship which feel good masha’allah

at present DD5 is standing on the sitting room window ledge using scare tactics at passers by, which is amusing her greatly, and from the window I can see my boys lolling about on the street talking “boy things” with their friend a few doors down…
apart from that, and the huge amount of tennis we’ve been watching in our house over the past couple of weeks, things have just been rolling on slowly, however the difference now is that they’re rolling IN our direction as opposed to AWAY from us at the alarming rate they were a few weeks ago.

there has been plenty of outdoor play in the garden for the wee and not so wee ones
and some quiet family bonding which has been much needed and extremly rewarding masha’allah

alot of changes are waiting for us on the horizon insha’allah, and we’re looking forward to them with relish…I’m loathe to say anything more..fate feels like a fickle thing sometimes, so you’ll have to wait a little longer for the rest of our news insha’allah…..

I’m becoming a bit inconsistent with my blogging lately I know…lots of things have been happening….unfortunately not the ones I wanted to happen, but thats qadr..and you can’t argue with it….

Sickness is making it’s way through the house again with the strange virus we had a few months back…one of the few pitfalls of having a large family is the fact that once illness hits it just keeps going round and round and round….and it begins to seem like it’s never going to shift…
Fortunately while sickness dwells within us, the builder have decided to grace us with their long awaited presence and have removed all but the toilet from the bathroom (including the toilet cistern!!) and they apparently wont be back in place till Friday! But hey! I have the eco loo I wanted and it’ll definately cut down water consumption for the week masha’allah…

what else??? hijrah..we dont talk about!!
cars!! we dont talk about!!!!
Mechanics..we have evil thoughts about……

the strange thing is..all this living out of boxes and cases is doing strange things to me…it’s making me crave domesticity…..I mean I’m dreaming decorating and new furniture…..and having a proper…..structure!!!!
it’s all very scarey….not sure I like it!!!!

that came to mind this morning….

*the fact that I’m feeling stifled by “stuff”…all I want to do is grab enough to keep me going and run away..I’m hugely irritated by the fact that “stuff” belonging to us has become so important that it warrents it’s own trip overseas to get settled before I can….this is WRONG!!!!

*that I think I’m slowing down internally…I seem to be folding in on myself and sinking in to my own thoughts…I’ve become very quiet..this is not like me….I think I may be depressed…or perhaps just a bit miffed by the fact that I’m STILL stuck somewhere I don’t want to be…

*I think I want to try and write again..and spend some time taking pictures that will make my heart sing….

smoothie

Originally uploaded by Seeking-Taqwa

We’re on a health kick…those of us that can  be bothered that is….

so what better way to start the day than a fruit smoothie…

here’s what went in the blender…

4 bananas
2 cups of mixed berries
a BIG tub of live brimming with friendly bac..bio yogurt
and a generous swipe of honey….

several cups of that and a probio capsule (thats an extra 4 billion friendly bacs!!) and I feel….happy….
not entirely well…..but happy
I’ve got a friendly bac party going on in my gut!!!!!