Bismillahir Rahmanir Raheem
Day 2: "Prayer / Mercy"Creating Memories Blogger Neelu started a Ramadan photo journal challenge. Today was the first day of Ramadan for me but I'll just start with day 2. Okay, okay, I just didn't take a dawn picture!
Since I have children (alhamdulilah) I woke up and took them straight to the Ramadan calendar we'd assembled for them. I had used large post-it stickers numbered with each day (glitter glue was involved, oh yeah!) of the month on a large poster board tacked to the wall.
Next year, since they'll be older, I will switch from post-it's to numbered cones inshAllah... Roomier for the daily treats! I figured returning back after Iftar to cross off the day on the calendar will help too.
We made sure to practice Surah Fatiha, listen to Quran, make ramdan karim cards, and test light the Ramadan lanterns we'd made (although we did not manage to light them again after Iftar).
Before Iftar we read our dua we'd taped to the wall after making into a glittertastic little poster. A little art museum visit broke the day up after so much inside learning.
After making food together and the actual Iftar we were too wiped out to light Ramadan lanterns, one of which we'd made, so inshAllah we can do that tomorrow after Iftar.
I am investing all my efforts into making the month of Ramadan special for my kids inshAllah. As a convert, I find religious holidays...lackadaisical or just plain un-festive here in the West for us Muslims. It's difficult starting traditions when your culture doesn't present/support/ expand upon your holiday. So with that said, forgive me if you found the above explanation of our first Ramdan 2012 day boring! I'd like to remember it for later years as well a contrast it to last years for improvement purposes. InshAllah there *will* actually be improvements :)
What ideas do you implement to involve your young ones in the month of Ramadan?