To celebrate this special day that only happens every four years, I've once again gotten together with a few friend bloggers over at Multicultural Kids Blog to showcase leaping activities the world.
Since I had already started our leap month of February with a leaping defda'a (Arabic for frog), I thought I would end it with another animal from my Arabic Animal Alphabet Poster that leaps.
The 17th letter Za (ẓā’) is represented by Thareef the zabi, which is antelope in Arabic.
Thareef is always playing practical jokes on his friends.
Other words that use Za are zarif (elegant), zufr (fingernail), and zuhr (noon).
We had just finished our latest large box of cereal and when I was placing it in the recycle bin, I realized I could make something out of it. I gathered some supplies and came up with this Khatam gift tag. It was so easy to do, I'm gong to make a couple to have on hand.
Place a piece of double sided tape in the middle of one of the 3 inch square card stock and offset it before placing it on the second piece to create an eight point star, also called a khatam.
Cut out one section of your cereal box and place double sided tape on one end and fold it over. Place the card stock khatam over the doubled up cereal box and trace out the design.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Cut out the shape.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Erase your pencil marks.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Place the khatam on another section of the cereal box and place the stencil over the shape. Chalk the design.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Punch holes in all eight points.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Cut off a piece of string, twine or embroidery thread about two arm lengths. Find the half way point and go through the khatam at the below two points.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Leave the top string alone for now, start going through the other holes, going back to two space from the top starting point. Then you'll go back through two space from your second entry point.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Keep stringing your star until you have a square design in the middle, like this. Your two strings should both be at the same hole, but coming in and out of different directions.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Take your longer string and redo the design, but this time creating a second square in the center. Your string should once again come to the same hole as the other string. Keep both strings tight and tie them together at the top. Go up about five inches, tie another knot and cut off the extra sting.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Wrap one of the extra string pieces around your fingers a few times.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Take the second string and tie a knot around the loop you just made.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Cut off any extra string about five inches from the top and use that to tie a little knot about a quarter inch from the top of the loop. Cut off the extra string from the second knot close to the knot.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Cut off the bottom loop of your tassel and attach your bead to the top. Make sure it has a big enough hole for two stings to go through.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Attach your tassel to the bottom of your tag.
Khatam Gift Tag Tutorial by A Crafty Arab
Your tag is complete and ready to be given out with any gift. Give it alone, or add it to the Arabic Initial Wrapping Paper Tutorial I showed you how to make last week. Here is the back of the tag, left blank so you can write To/From on it.
I have a birthday party tomorrow for a very special friend.
I've bought her a book and wanted to make my present stand out from the others on the gift table.
I decided to use the technique I used last July on this Arabic Initial Tote Bag and decorate her wrapping paper. I've personalized it with the initial, Kha, the seventh letter of the Arabic alphabet and the first letter of her name.
I hope this tutorial shows you how easy it is to do so you can try it!
Supplies
Pencil with new eraser
Doule sided tape
Kraft wrapping paper
Scissors
Xacto
Sharpie
Ink stamp
Arabic Initial Wrapping Paper by A Crafty Arab
Wrap your gift and set it aside. Mark you pencil eraser with the Sharpie so it's easy to see the cut you'll need to make with the Xacto. Cut the sides so your eraser shape is now a square.
Arabic Initial Wrapping Paper by A Crafty Arab
Print out and then cut a large Arabic letter out of paper. You can used regular paper, but I made my letter out of yellow cardstock so it's easier for you to see in the photos. Use the double sided tape to add it to the front of your present. Use only a tiny bit of tape as you'll need to take the letter off. Start stamping!
Arabic Initial Wrapping Paper by A Crafty Arab
Stamp all around your letter. Stamp your shapes closer together the closer you are to the letter and fade out the design as you move towards the edges of the present.
Arabic Initial Wrapping Paper by A Crafty Arab
When you are happy with your stamping, remove your paper letter and present your gift!
Arabic Initial Wrapping Paper by A Crafty Arab
I wasn't sure if I wanted to go with gold or silver ink so included both in the supplies photo. When I was playing around on scrap paper, I realized I liked the gold by itself. But please feel free to combine colors, just wash your eraser between colors.
If you enjoyed this craft, be sure to check out my Crafty Ramadan Pinterest board with more Arab and Islamic diy tutorials.
Books play a major role in my life as I have always been taught that education gives you freedom.
I love gathering books from different locations I've visited and using them in my sessions as an Arab storyteller. My Instagram feed shows some of my collection under #CraftyArabStorytelling.
In the meantime, my list of books for Muslim children in my Amazon Associates shop grew to close to 150 books. (I do get paid fees for being an associate and use them to buy tutorial materials, fyi). It's now time to put it in an easy to read list for anyone to use.
So without future ado, I present the list of 99 Muslim children books. Authors with an * next to their name have more then one book published, please check here for other books by them.
Quilling is an art form that uses paper stripes and a slotted tool that looks like a sewing needle with the end clipped off.
Recently I was paid a visit by With a Spin, who left me with her beautiful cookie cutters. Since I'm an artist, I didn't even think of putting them in the kitchen and immediately I saw them as quilling walls to fill.
In the past, I've had to build my own walls to make letters or arabesque shapes. But here were walls that were reusable over and over to give me the same consistent shape. I couldn't wait to try them out.
To the disappointment of my baking daughter, the cookie cutters came into the studio.
I hope you enjoy this cookie cutter tutorial and look around your house for new, unusual, walls to fill.
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters Tutorial
Supplies
Paper crimping tool
Watercolor paper
White shadowbox frame
Scissors
Glue
Quilling tool
Two colors of 12 inch quilling stripes
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters by A Crafty Arab
Start by making beehive quilling stripes. Start a little bit down one end and fold the paper onto itself. Take your tool out, go down a bit more on the strip and do it again.
I made four and a half to fill the moon. For the star, I used 3 stripes, but I precut them all in half stripes before I beehived quilled them. The six small stripes fit in much better then trying to fit in the longer stripes in the star. (You'll thank me for hours of your life back, trust me.)
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters by A Crafty Arab
Wiggle them in. It's a tight space. If you have tweezers or a toothpick, use them.
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters by A Crafty Arab
Place glue dots where your paper meets.
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters by A Crafty Arab
Run a strip through your crimping tool to make the paper corrigated.
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters by A Crafty Arab
Wiggle your quilled piece out of the cookie cutter. I placed one of the same color around it first and then a contrasting color over that.
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters by A Crafty Arab
Wait for everything to dry, peel off all the glue from your fingertips, then glue your shapes to your paper.
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters by A Crafty Arab
I used watercolor paper and this blue color because I still hadn't cleaned up my workspace from our last art piece.
You can also use colored cardstock behind your shapes to make them stand out. Your next dilemma will be to decide on placement in the frame. Put them together? Place them apart?
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters by A Crafty Arab
Of course, nothing can beat white background in a white frame. Always a classic.
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters by A Crafty Arab
For those that follow me on Instagram, you've already seen a sneak peek of playing around with different colors too.
Quilled Moon and Star with Cookie Cutters by A Crafty Arab
There are two more shapes in the cookie cutter set. I might actually take the left over green triangles from my last project (did I already mention the messy workspace?) and start playing around with architecture.
Stay tuned as cookie cutter quilling might show up again!
Today I am getting together with a few of my blogging friends, and we are sharing multicultural toys and activities for kids. I wanted to introduce you to this Arabic Wooden Sorting Game.
When my children were small, my parents brought them this Arabic sorting game from one of their many travels.
Arabic Wooden Sorting Game by A Crafty Arab
This game has been one of our favorites over the years because it introduced children to a few words at a time to get them started learning Arabic.
The game comes in a self contained box for storage, a lid that slides in and out and 8 slots inside.
It comes with five large wood pieces and forty small ones. The five large, long wood pieces have Arabic letters, Arabic numbers, shapes, food and animals on them.
Arabic Wooden Sorting Game by A Crafty Arab
The smaller, square pieces have the same objects, only on individual squares.
Arabic Wooden Sorting Game by A Crafty Arab
To play, you place a large wood piece in a sliding slot on the lid when the box is closed. You choose one of the smaller wood pieces and place it into the open slot.
Here the number one is getting ready to go into the number one slot.
Arabic Wooden Sorting Game by A Crafty Arab
We also used to flip the squares over and play a matching game before we created our own last year.
With Valentines Day around the corner, love is in the air.
I thought it might be fun to give you ideas on how to show your hobb (Arabic for love) in another language this year to be different.
Here are 5 ways to say I love You in Arabic.
5 Ways to Say I Love You in Arabic by A Crafty Arab
1. Proclaim some Hobb
Arabic is an Afroasiatic langauge, and similar to it's Semitic siblings, nouns change depending on if you are talking to a girl or a boy.
Arabic is comparable to French, where nouns ending in -e tend to be feminine, or Irish, where nouns ending in -óir/-eoir and -ín are always masculine, and those ending -óg/-eog or -lann are always feminine*.
The Arabic word for I is Ana and the word for Love is Hobb. So placing the two together is Ana Hobb, but you need to also add an ending depending on who you are addressing.
If you are saying I Love You to a woman, you place the fatḥah under the last letter: أنا أحبكِ - ana ahobbuki.
If you are saying I Love You to a man, you place the kasrah over the last letter: أنا أحبكَ - ana ahobbuka.
If you are saying I love you to a group of three or more people you add a letter to the end: أنا أحبّكم - ana ahobbukum.
There are also different ways to say I love you in different situations, from love in the Bible to love for a lover. You can also hear some of them here.Or use this graphic.
2. Mail some Hobb
I started my business eight years ago because I couldn't find cards to give my loved ones that were in Arabic. Since then I've created many options for others to send some love.
Here are some cards that I made in my studio this week that will all be listed in my Zibbet shop soon.
5 Ways to Say I Love You in Arabic by A Crafty Arab
3. Sing some Hobb
Mohammed Foaud is an Egyptian vocalist who has a wonderful Arabic love song called El Hob El Haqiqi, which translates to My Love That Is True.
In the song, he sings of a love that
Teaches us how to forgive and to forget about yesterday.
Teaches us to constantly think about the forthcoming days.
Listen to the full song here:
Umm Khalthom is another Egyptian vocalist who also has a fantastic song called Night of Love. I remember many nights listening to this coming from the radio in our house.
4. Eat some Hobb
A saying of the past was "A way to a man's heart is his stomach" but honestly, doesn't food work on just about anyone?
Valentine's Day is in February, which tends to be a dark, cold month for us.
Looking for some poems to read to your loved one? Check out my book section in my Amazon library (I'm an affiliate member). If you are looking for love poems to read, grab this book to serenade your hobb.
Learn to Say I Love You (Correctly) in Arabic by A Crafty Arab
There are so many ways to say I love you in Arabic. I hope you try one of them this Valentines Day!
*Grammatically there are always exceptions to these rules and endings for all languages. Please check a dictionary or local dialects to verify.
Yesterday I decided to use one of the animals from my Arabic Alphabet Game Set for the start of a month long photo challenge on Instagram.
Doing so reminded me that I have yet to finish turning all the Arabic letters in my Arabic Alphabet Animal Poster into coloring pages, like I had promised.
Well, I decided to fix that and today present the letter Dhad which is represented by Dhamen the defda'a, which is how you say frog in Arabic. This little guy likes to spend his days helping all his friends around the oasis where he lives.
Other words that use Dhad are dhimad (bandage), dahk (laugh), and dhabaab (mist).
