My Salawat Pillow - 30 Day Craft Challenge

My Salawat Pillow - 30 Day Craft Challenge

Salam all, by the grace of Allah we have made it to Day 19 of the Craft Challenge. I am so blown away by all of your support! Thank you for continuing to follow the challenge and sharing your feedback and inspirational ideas. Today I talked to my kids about the importance of loving Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) and those in his household (the Ahlul Bayt). We talked about the many verses in the Quran which emphasize loving and following the Ahlul Bayt. Specifically we went over verse number 56 in Surat al Ahzab (chapter 33), which states, "Surely Allah and His angels send blessings upon the Prophet; O you who believe! call for (Divine) blessings on him and salute him with a (becoming) salutation". After reviewing this verse of the Quran, we began preparing for our craft.

In today's craft we made our very own squishable, huggable, "Salawat Pillow". The idea is, every time they see it, or hug it, they should send one salawat (salutations and blessings upon the Prophet and his family). In Arabic, it appears as, ٱللَّٰهُمَّ صَلِّ عَلَىٰ مُحَمَّدٍ وَعَلَىٰ آلِ مُحَمَّدٍ. 

Again, this craft is a super simple and child friendly activity - no needles involved and no sewing involved! I hope you are able to do this with your children and please let me know how it goes!

Materials:

• Two square pieces of felt - we used 30cmx30cm 
• Pencil
• Fabric Scissors
• Ruler
• Permanent markers or Fabric Markers for Decoration
• Pillow Stuffing 

  

  Here's what we used to make the Salawat Pillow

Steps:

1. Fold one of your felt pieces in half and trace a "half-heart" shape with your pencil- try to make it as large as the fabric will allow 
2. Make a smaller half-heart inside this one - the distance between the two hearts should be at least 5 cm. The larger the distance the easier it is for smaller children to tie knots

   

   We free-handed the heart drawings

3. Cut out the larger heart and then use that as a template to cut the heart shape on your other felt piece

   

   We used the first heart shape to cut the second one

4. Now you should have two identical heart shapes and a smaller heart shape drawn inside with pencil

   

   This is what they looked like

5. Start cutting straight lines approximately 2-3cm apart, stopping where you've drawn your inner circle - some people measure exactly, but we did this free-hand
6. Do this for both hearts

   

   We used our fabric scissors to cute these straight lines, we did one heart at a time

7. Flip your hearts over to the side where the pencil is not visible. Use your pencil to right the word "SALAWAT" on the felt and allow your child to trace these letters with the fabric markers or permanent markers

   

   Tracing fun!

8. We did this on both pieces of the fabric - wait a few minutes to make sure this marker dries 

   

   We were lucky to have bright and vibrant colours

9. Match the two heart fabrics, one on top of the other - the writing should face outward
10. Now, start tying knots - one string from one fabric and one string from the other fabric

    

    Lots of practice with tying knots!

11. Make sure they are double knots. Do this all the way around and leave about 10cm of space of an opening

    

    This is the space we used to stuff the pillow

12. Stuff the pillow stuffing inside the pillow and spread around to make sure its equally stuffed through out the heart shape 

    

    Stuffing away!

13. When your satisfied with the appearance of the pillow, tie the remaining knots and close up the pillow 

    

    We knotted it all the way around!

14. Allow your child to hug and squeeze the pillow (and recite salawat each time)! 

    

    So squeezable!

I hope this craft was inspirational for you and your child! May the last 10 nights of Ramadan bring you peace and blessings. And finally, May Allah send peace and blessings upon Prophet Muhammad and his Family. See you all tomorrow!