Today my family and I hopped in the car and drove to the masjid for a seminar entitled The Final Journey.  The program included how to take care of the sick, what to do when approaching death, what to do at the time of death, how to perform ghusl on the deceased, how to wrap the body, how to pray salaatul Janazah, how to bury the deceased, and how to deal with grief.  It was really informative, and well organized.  The turn out was amazing, masha’Allah.  May Allah reward the organizers.

On the way back home, my family and I had an interesting discussion.  My sister and I were telling my mom and dad that the only part of the program we thought was unnecessary was the 20 minutes spent on being patient after death.  It was something worth mentioning, but I was convinced that people already *knew* all that, so what was the point on saying it over and over again?  Abu countered my statement with:

(51:55) And remind, for indeed, the reminder benefits the believers

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My family is known for making an event special by the food we eat.  Whenever anything special is on the horizon, we immediately ask ourselves, “What’s for food?”  Meaning, what will we eat to commemorate this moment in time.   For example, my sister’s birthday was only a few weeks ago.  The weekend before it came we asked her, “What do you want to do for you birthday?”  Our conversation afterward was a little slow, so I cut to the chase, “Look, what are we going to eat?”

Birthdays are one thing, and Super Bowl Sunday is another.  The Super Bowl is like our Eid for food.  Every year we try to come up with something to eat that is more spectacular and disgusting than the year before.  We’ve had home made chicken wings, twice baked potatoes, chilli, fajitas, tacos, you name it.

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I’ve never really been into the sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond.  I think I’ve only seen one complete episode.  I was watching it with my sister and I was quickly turned off by it.  Why?  Well, the premise of the sitcom is that Raymond is this guy that is annoyingly always in need of having everyone be happy with him, and for the most part it works out and, well… everybody loves Raymond.  What’s so bad about that?  My sister told me that the character Raymond reminds her of me.

I felt so… pegged.  I hate when that happens; when someone says something about you that is so on point, it’s uncomfortable and you can’t deny it but you really wish you could.

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I don’t know about you, but sometimes I have a hard time watching football and superheros. Between all the spandex and fit bodies, there is just too much exposure on the screen. Spandex just isn’t the right material for men to wear.

But are superheros and football players the only culprits for men in immodest clothing? I don’t think so.

I’m not trying to hate, honestly, I’m not. It’s just that I see it all the time: a hijabi/jilbabi girl with her brother/spouse; while she’s making an effort to cover her body… he isn’t.

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My students are cute.  Everyday I have such a great time in the classroom with my 4th graders.  Even if I’m having a terrible day, they always manage to make me smile or laugh.  And it isn’t even because they’re trying to cheer me up.  It’s just the way they are.

Take for example one day in Social Studies.  I was reviewing vocabulary words with them from the chapter.  I asked them, “Who can tell me what metropolitan means?”  One of them leapt up from his seat, and stuck his hand straight out frantically and said, “Sister!! Sister!! I know!! I know!!”  I asked him what it meant, and he said so confidently,

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