Birthday Tea Party

Pinata...
Button, button, who has the button?

And of course the tea party with the Barbie cake.

Yes indeed that is a real porceline tea set with real peppermint tea in one pot, and real raspberry tea in the other! They were able to pour for each other and everything!

I can't believe she's five years old!

Happy birthday sweet angel.

Depression; A Disease of the Nafs or Endogenous?

I have started listening to and taking notes on The Purification of the Heart 17-cd set of lectures by sidi Sheikh Hamza Yusuf. In this series Sheikh Hamza is translating into English and teaching from the text written by a Mauritanian Sheikh who wrote it originally in Arabic.

The suffering of the world is spoken of in term of wars, starvation, hatred, competition, and the struggle of the survival of the fittest. Yet all the suffering of the world originates in the human heart. Every crime committed, every act of oppression, every callous cruelty, and every injustice to the self or others emanates from the hearts of men.The soundest of hearts was the heart of the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) who, through his purity and singularity of intention, transformed the world. His teaching remains and the challenge is for each of us to take it and to transform our hearts with it, thereby, transforming the very world in which we live.

Islam has clearly defined that there are several diseases of the heart, which make the human being shrink further and further away from God (ie in a state of sinfulness, whereas being without sin makes the human being closer to God). Things like envy, fear of poverty, using religion as a means for increasing your worldly position, seeking praise from anyone or anything other than God, and miserlyness ...to name just a few.

I have been told by many muslims that depression is not an endogenous physiological "disease" over which the person afflicted by it has no control and the only hope for them would be to take medication; Rather, many folks have stated that depression is a spiritual disease, and that the cure is to get closer to God, delve deeper into Spirituality, and therein one will find the remedy.

I thought all of that was hogwash until I came across this series of Sheikh Hamza's, mashallah!

What is really really helping me, and Sheikh Hamza said it's medicine, and now I believe him, is reciting the

surah Ikhlas ("Purity"- which is said to be equal to one-third of the Quran!) from the Quran three times, three times a day;

Bismillah irahman iraheem;

Qul hol wal aho ahad

Allah hu samad

Lam yaleed wa lam yoolad

Wa lam yakool ahu kufu wan ahad.

Translation

In the name of God, Most Gracious, Ever Merciful.

Say, He is God, the One; God, the Independent and Besought of all.

He begets not, nor is He begotten.

And there is none like unto Him.

as well as the dua' Istikar (please forgive me if I have pronounced any of this Arabic wrong, my intentions are good! As far as I can tell this is the name Hamza Yusuf gave to this dua', however I can't find it online-) three times, three times a day.

Allahumma inni ma'udu bikka

wa 'ana ba'lamu

wa astafiruka min kulli ma la 'alamu. Ameen.

Translation; Oh God I seek refuge in you that I should make shirk (partners)

with you and I am aware of it, and I ask forgiveness for any (shirk that I make)

that I'm not aware of. Amen.

Jezakallah kharian, Sheikh Hamza, and may Allah the Most Gracious the Most Merciful bless you.

Waiting

In my darkest hour
when the walls are closing in?

When will the healing come?

After I've lost it all
and there's nothing left?

When will the healing come?

I've tried and tried to change
and failed over and over again.

When will the healing come?

I'm such a failure
that I'm unloveable.

When will the healing come?

No chance of success,
I'm just trouble.

When will the healing come?

I can't continue
without support.

When will the healing come?

A marriage broken
All that's left is rubble.

When will the healing come?

When I'm dying Lord
and you're callin' me home?

...When will the healing come?

The Jena Six

Another Truth untold. Unbelieveable!

Shame, shame, shame

"...In honor of men of courage, faith and vision: investors in a glorious dream, of winning the wilderness for the white man...."

"...By that gallant band of axemen pioneers and indian fighters who at the risk and loss of life opened the doors of destiny to the white race in Kentucky and the west."


This plaque simply is mortifying.

It's shameful that things like this are still erect on Government - funded public sites! Yes indeed, payed for by American citizens' tax dollars!

It is placed in Fort Boonesborough State Park here in Kentucky, near the ruins of the original Fort of Daniel Boone, NOT at the reproduction Fort where most tourists come to sightsee.

Generally speaking, I take pride in being able to say that Kentucky is better than Ohio. For one thing, Ohio has too many rules! It seems like a few too many folks who are "guardians" on the Myers-Briggs personality spectrum live in Ohio. Ohio is also where there are just a lot of trashy people. Ohioans always like to pretend like those people are "Appalachians from Kentucky". They have a real denial prob;em, they can't seem to own the fact that trashy people are found pretty much everywhere and the great Buckeye State isn't exempt from that. Hello, can you say "Hamiltucky"???? It ain't in Kentucky my friends, it's in Ohio!

Especially here in my neck of the woods, we are a pretty International mix, with 11% Japanese in my son's elementary school, a lot of Germans and other International people living here because of so many big corporations relocating here. After all, Ohio has too many taxes! And you can't smoke in restaurants in Ohio (not that I do, it's simply the principal of being allowed to do as you wish that I am all for.) Ohio has too daggon many rules.

However, after finding this darn thing, I have to say that
it's embarassing to be living in Kentucky and know that crap like this is still around.

Shame, shame, SHAME!

What I've Been Up To

Before....
And after!


My parents gifted us this lovely Thomasville dining room set. However it is over 30 years old and was desperately in need of some severe repairs! So not only did I recover it, I first had to totally rebuild the seat's strapping and cut new foam before I could even think of stapling on the new material.

I think it looks great, although I didn't redo the welting (see how in the old way each seam has a cord between it and the next piece of material?). Welting is sooo insanely difficult for this beginner sewer! I just couldn't swing it

What do y'all think?

A culture of Denial

We Midwesterners (at least in the rural area north of Cincinnati where all of my family is from) come from a tradition of denial in the face of conflict. Yep, if a member of the family does something that the rest of the family doesn't relate to and/or can't understand (like convert to Islam) then they all just pretend it hasn't happened. Just sweep it under the rug so you can't see the "dirt", make everything appear pleasant so you don't have to face that dirt and actually do something about it.



Normal people with actual coping skills would let the dirt sit there in the floor and they would confront it; They would either decide they dislike it and sweep it up and get rid of it, or accept the fact that it's there and live with dirt on the floor.



But no not my family. The dirt can actually get heaping as high as Rumpke mountain and they still will refuse to acknowledge it's there. And woe to the person who points out to them that "hey, there's a pile of dirt the size of Rumpke's mountain under the rug, so what do you want to do about it?" for they will suffer the wrath of "How dare you disrespect us like that. Why the nerve of you, saying that there's a mountain of dirt under our rug."...and they explode on you, which to you is totally out of left field. After all, wouldn't any normal sane person just confront the dirt and decide what they want to do about it if it's presence in their house makes them uncomfortable??????????????????????????????????



This lovely little facet of my filial culture is starting to simply wear me out. I don't know how much more of it I can take. I'm tired of sweeping the parts of me that make them uncomfortable under the rug.They're fully aware that those parts are there, it's just that they have requested that I don't reveal these facets of myself when in their presence.



I don't think I can deal with them anymore.



I found another book (full of lies) about Unveiling Islam: An Insider's Look at Muslim Life and Beliefsby Ergun Mehmet Caner in my mother's bedroom yesterday. What a crock. I confronted her on it, because I am really hurt that she's reading, well, really any book about Islam, let alone something so hateful, instead of just sitting down and talking to me. What a fiasco.

I just read all of the tags people have suggested for this book on Amazon.com. The tags are;
anti-islam, bigoted, biased, hate, islamophobia, coulter, ann coulter, brilliance

I added these tags;

lies, one-sided, hateful, inciting violence

So now I am getting "in her face" with my beliefs because I asked her why she isn't asking a real live muslim like her daughter these questions she must have instead of reading a hateful book that's full of lies (subhanallah, the guys who wrote it are ex-muslims who claim to be Christian).

Well, I don't know any command by Jesus, peace be upon him, that teaches folks to be hateful or spread blatant un-truths about another religion.

Jesus said to love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you!

Turn the other cheek, not an eye for an eye!

Blessed are the peacemakers!!!!!!!!!

There is nothing Christian in this freakin' book.

I am devastated.

My parents are freakin' hateful Anne Coulter G. Gordon Libby Rush Limbaugh Neo-Cons.

They are everything that I feel is wrong with our Country, and I have to love them, because they are my parents.

That's freakin' difficult! As muslims, we are commanded several times in the Quran and in the hadith, which are the sayings of the prophet, to respect our parents and family. It's a major tenet of Islam to show respect to your family, no matter what the circumstances. Inshallah, God-willing, I can live up to that ideal. Ameen.