I'm Blessed with 3 daughters

The girls with Baba and Kareem

Thankful

In observance of the Thanksgiving last week, my 14 years old, Nour wrote this letter for a class assignment.

بالعربي

I have to give you – my dear readers – some details in order for you to understand why I was so happy with this note.

As you might all know, I have been in the United States for 12 + years now.  When we first moved here Farah, my oldest daughter was 4. Now she is 17. Arabic was the main language spoken in our house for years and to maintain that and to make sure that the girls won’t forget their mother tongue, we put them in an Arabic school that was sponsored by the Saudi Embassy. This school was established to serve the Saudi students who came with their families to study in AR. To make a long story short, Husam managed to have Farah enrolled and she started 1^st grade. It was a BIG challenge to teach her something that she practices only few hours a day!!

Now, Farah is starting college, so I took her with me yesterday (since I work at that college) to finish her paper work and registration. She had to leave the office while I was in a meeting so she wrote me this note in Arabic. I was happy when I read and realized that all the effort that we put in her did not go wasted. I love my Farah !!

Mama's Song

Mother's day note :)

Yesterday was Mother's day here in the states. My girls have pampered me with treats. My oldest, Farah booked me for a surprise massage session. She'd told me that she has a meeting in school and we have to pick her friend from some place and that place ended up being the massage center. It was a lovely surprise. My second daughter, Nour fixed me breakfast. Her's was a shock for me because among all her siblings, she's the least to show affection!! but I was so happy to realize that she actually loves me ;)
Now my third daughter Zayna, wrote me tons of love notes and mother's day wishes but this one was the best of all.

 " I hope you can live till your 1000000000000 and still look young "
Now that's a girl that knows her mama...it's all about looking young.....lol


 I hope all of you are well. I missed you!!

Yup...she's right

I have teenage daughters, but I don't drink...I'll shop :D

"بسْ إنتَ"!!

I have three young ladies 17, 14, 8. When I look back, it was just yesterday when they were young and we used to go to the park, push them on the swing, lay by their side and read a bed time story. And now, my oldest is fixing to graduate from high school and start university life.....GOSH!! where did time go?!

When I came across this article, I sent it immediately to my husband, he called me and we both teared up just talking about the girls and how fast they grow up!! we re-called some of the sentences and words that they used to say when they were little. I cry every time I read this and wanted to share it with you.

Cherish your ladies, they will grow a lot faster than you have planned..

بناتي كبرن.. صرن صبايا صغيرات، وأشعر بمتعة خرافية وأنا أحادثهن على الهاتف!

كأن ضحكاتهن الصغيرة تخمش قلبي.

لكنها متعة دامعة، حين أسأل واحدة من سيداتي الأميرات الثلاث: أطلبي مني أي شيء، ماذا ينقصك؟ فتقول بحسرة: «بس إنت»!

للطفلة سحرٌ آخر... ضحكتها، بكاؤها، حردها، دلعها، نومها على ركبة الأب، دفاترها الملونة، نقش أساورها، وحنان قلبها الذي حين أحتضنها.... يا إلهي كم يشبه رفيف فراشات ملونة على قميصي!

يكون البيت موحشاً دون ضحكات البنات، وتخفت رائحة الياسمين المتعربش على الحيطان، ويصير الشاي مُرّاً، وتبرد ألوان الستائر، وكم أشعر بالوحدة حين لا أسمع موسيقى خطواتهن الصاعدة الدرج!

ترتبك أيامي إن ما بدأت بصباحاتهن المتثائبة، وإن ما نفضن شعرهن المبلل في وجهي، وعبأن جيوبي بالأمل.

تبقى قبلاتهن على وجهي عطراً خفيفاً، وعناقاتي لهن أظلّ أحملها كالتميمة، تحفظني من وحشة المدن البعيدة، وأصابعهن تربت على كتفي أنىّ ابتعدت.

للبنات في البيت رائحة الأمومة، طعم الرضا، دلع الصديقات المدللات، وطيش النساء اللواتي يثقن بكيدهن.

فساتينهن الملونة، أحذيتهن، خواتمهن، مشابك شعرهن، عطورهن، ألعابهن ودببتهن،... وكأس الشاي الذي من يد طفلتي "يعادل كل خصور النساء وكل العواصم"!

ضحكات الصغرى تتساقط على سريري كالخرز الملون، والوسطى تعدّ بأصابعها شعراتي البيضاء، والكبرى تحاول استدراجي: تعال نغسل مزاجك الملول برحلة للبحر؟

وأنا بينهن كسلطان!

ثلاثُ بنات كالأغنيات، كالأساور، كثلاثة أسماء للبهجة، يشبهن ورداً ينهض من نومه، أو ثلاث عرائس يرقصن على غيم خفيف، فيتركن ما يترك الندى على ورق شجرة الدراق.

أو ربما أنهن موسيقى خفيفة لا تشبه أكثر من خفق القلب.

للطفلة في البيت وقعُ الطائر، خفة النحلات، مرحُ التلميذات على درج المدرسة، لضحكاتها ما يجعل حتى طعم النهار أحلى!

ولما تمدّ يدك تدفعها على «الأرجوحة»، فتصيح بك أن تدفعها أكثر.. لترتفع في الهواء أكثر، يطير قلبك خلفها ويعود معها، ويعود يطير معها، «كأن هذه البنت روحي»... تقول لنفسك!

وتجيء الصغرى تمد وجهها تقبّلك وتركض، وتلوّح بشعرها قبل أن تنعف في حِجرك ضحكاتها الحنونة، وتقطف من شجرة قريبة بعض فتات الياسمين، تفركه بوجهك، وترميه في عبّ قميصك، تعود تقول "يا الللله.. هذه البنت أجمل ما صنعتُ في عمري"!

وإذ ترتبك الكبرى الصموتة، تودّ لو تمازحك وتتهيب، وتتوق أن تتركض معك وتلاعبك وتحضنك، لكنها خجلى، وقليلة الكلام، تقول في نفسك "يا اسمي، ويا قهوتي، ويا خيوط قميصي، ويا تفاصيل دمي تعالي أقبّلك كثيراً. لم يبق لي في هذه الأرض الكثير"!

......

أيتها الصبايا الصاعدات إلى أعمارهن على الدرج المقابل لنزولي، تمهلن قليلاً؛ أريد أن أراكن أكثر!

...

إبراهيم جابر إبراهيم



Chicken Soup for the Mother's Soul



This is a great read for mothers and children. I am planning to let my Farah and Nour read it when I am done with it. It had too many great stories that we can learn lessons from. I usually read when I am in the gym, and the other day I was jogging on the treadmill and I started crying while reading one of the stories. I could not hold my tears as they were dropping unintentionally...lol
I will do like my friend Wafa' does and recommend this book, however, I am a slow reader so it'll take a while until I finish reading this one and recommend another. Anyway, if you plan to read it, I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.
Love ~

Good morning and have a nice day :)

Salam
As I mentioned in my last post, kids have started school last Thursday. It was a good start, Al7amdulellah. Farah is going to 11th grade, Nour is 8th grade, Zayna is 3rd, and little prince Kareem is going to Bubbles Day Care :D
Everything is organized now and life is back to the status that I like, routine.
I stopped the cleaning girl that used to come to clean my house. She wasn't doing a good job. So, I will try to add some chores into my schedule and the girls as well, let’s see how that works. Ramadan has been going pretty well around our house. Husam is helping me a lot with preparing the meals and adding some of his own touches around our daily menu :)
This week end was busy but full of fun. Friday night we had a pot-luck Iftar with our friends at our house. It was a very nice evening. Me, H., the kids had good time.
On Sturday, we had one of H. friends and his family for Iftar. It was nice, but they have babies so it wasn’t the best time for them though. When I see mothers and families with small babies I thank Allah that mine are all grown up ;)
I need to start thinking about Eid shopping for me and the kids. Talking about shopping I went to the mall this weekend and got some nice things for my house. The girls got hoodies since the weather is getting chillier in the morning. Here is Nour trying the hoody that she ended up buying.

Last night, we had one of our friends’ daughter’s who is studying Journalism at the university. She is writing an article about Ramadan and wanted to observe a Muslim family during Ramadan, and she picked us :)
It was pretty good and a new experience. She went and interviewed each one of us and then she broke her fast with us and took some pictures. I will post that article as soon as it’s published. We will be famous :D
Off I go….LOVE

Work

7/16 was my first day at my new/old job. Before leaving to Lebanon, I used to work at a community college here in northwest Arkansas. I worked as an Academic Advisor and now I am back to the same place and job with extra addition; Learning Specialist, alhamdulillah. I am happy, excited, anxious, happy, excited, anx…..

I have been here for almost a month now. I have started my job three weeks after my arrival. I still have some things around the house that I haven’t finished yet. However, I have accomplished a lot in a very short time, so I am proud of myself and my hubby who really tried his best to have the house up and running in a short time, alhamdulillah.
I also have finished registering the girls in school and they will start in 8/19, can’t wait for that :) I still need to work on finding a school for Kareem though.
Today, I finally found a cleaning lady that will help me around the house, YAY. I am so happy and thankful for that. The house is so big and needs a lot of maintenance. The girls are helping in that while I’m at work, but I am SO picky and I like every job to be perfect so I end up complaining about their work and criticizing, which I know it’s wrong and discouraging, but I just can’t ignore any piece of dust on the furniture or a foot print on the floor :(

Don’t get bored, I’ll let you go now ;)

Take care

Cookies and more

Last week I made Brazek. It is an Arabic cookies covered with sesame. I got the recipe from my good friend Suzan. We all loved them and they didn’t last for more than few hours … lol

my homemade Brazek

On Monday, the girls were out of school for teacher’s day. Kareem’s day off was scheduled on Tuesday so we made a mother-daughters bonding day and took the bus to Beirut. The girls were so excited since this is their first time to ride the bus. We had breakfast out, did some shopping, ate lunch, more shopping, smoothies and ice-cream, and more shopping :D

Farah & Nour

It was great and we all needed that girls alone time without our two annoying boys ;)

We received the tickets to Dubai. We’ll be leaving on April 2nd and come back of the fifth, can’t wait.

The weather here is so hot and dusty, so bad. Makes me feel that my skin is clogged and I need to shower and wash my hands every minute, not nice!!
Hope you all are having a great week so far.
That’s it for me, off I go…