“Dear Ustadha Raidah” podcast is live!

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I’m so excited to share that my podcast series, Dear Ustadha Raidah, is live! Please tune in, and share it with your friends and family.

I’ve been quietly recording my podcast episodes at night, while my daughters are asleep. Alhamdulilah, for the most part, they haven’t been waking up much! This is also why a 60 min podcast is a bit beyond me, at this stage of my life :p Please make dua for me, my family, SeekersGuidance, and remember to donate to support this podcast series. Please rest assured that what you donate, in part, does reach me ❤ And woo, thank you for funding my life!


My letter came second in the Letter To The Beloved ﷺ competition!

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Alhamdulilah, my letter won second place in the Letters To The Beloved competition! I am so surprised, so grateful and a little embarrassed. You can read it here, alongside the incredible winning entry and my friend Lina Abdul Wahab’s heartbreaking third place entry.

My deepest gratitude goes to Letters to the Beloved ﷺ team, Rabata, Sanad Collective, and especially to Anse Tamara Gray bringing my letter to life with her warm, heartfelt recitation ❤ I hope to read it to my daughters when they’re older some day. You can listen to the recording here (scroll to 26 min). I loved hearing from Anse Tamara, as always, and was really moved by Brother Ali’s talk (48 min). He acknowledges the role of women in understanding Prophetic love.

I would love to say that I wrote this letter with a warm cup of tea at a quiet cafe – but I didn’t. I wrote it in my bedroom, in quiet snatches while my daughters were asleep, over several nights. (I try not to have tea close by because I could spill it on my MacBook Air in my chronic tiredness – as I have done previously!!!) I edited it a couple of times, and then sent it just in time for the deadline lol. This is my modus operandi, these days :p

If you’re an exhausted mama, I hope my letter brings you some comfort. If you’re an exhausted mama writer, then I hope my letter shows you that what we lack in time, we make up for in other innumerable ways – and God, in His Mercy, fills in the rest.

If you haven’t already, please read the different letters from past competitions. I’m blown away by what the children have written, especially! And maybe, just maybe, you can set the intention to write your own to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him). His blessed heart and soul is connected to ours, even when we forget.

Grow your own veggies workshop at @urbanhijau this Saturday!

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In less than a week, Irfan will be running a workshop at Urban Hijau! He has a talent for breaking down permaculture topics into easily digestible nuggets e.g. “Grow what grows!”

If you’re interested in growing your own fruits/veggies/simple herbs, and wondering how to make your own compost, then this workshop is for you. Please spread the word, and sign up before all participant spots are filled up!

“The Healing” is published!

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I’m thrilled to start off 2019 with my latest creative non-fiction piece, published by Lunch Ticket, as part of their Amuse-Bouche A La Carte series – The Healing. Thank you to the wonderful Lunch Ticket team, for giving my stories a home. I first read Adab at Seksan 🙂

I hope my stories speak to you, especially if you’re an exhausted mother of two (or more) little ones. It does get better.

I vividly remember submitting this 2 am, after yet another night of broken sleep. I’ve come to realise that these exhausting early years of motherhood have given me a kind of creative haze and lucidity – I am both slowed down and sped up. It’s like quicksand and slow motion film, all in one. Do I make sense? Ha. Who knows.

Letters to the Beloved ﷺ

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And We have not sent you, [O Muhammad], except as a mercy to the worlds [Al-Anbiyaa’ 21:107]

Keen to explore a writing exercise that is also spiritually elevating? Please sign up for the wonderful annual opportunity – Letters to The Beloved ﷺ

I love how this competition is open even to children, up to age 8. That’s how we can grow a more resilient, more compassionate and more forgiving generation of Muslims. By tying their hearts to the Beloved.

This reminds me of the stories I tell my daughter about Prophet Muhammed (peace and blessings be upon him). I hope to tie her heart to him, so that he will come alive to her, from this young, and for the rest of her life.