Alhamdulillah, I found that the hijab dolls were not only well received in Malaysia but also by sisters from around the globe. It was the perfect Eid gift! From then on, Dzaltastic has been creating modern Islamic products combining my work of surface pattern designing as well as sewing.

It’s been more than a year of sharing my work online and just a few months ago I’ve even designed the first Hijabi Flip Doll to enter the famous Sew Mama Sew’s Softie Contest. The doll was inspired by the famous ‘what do you have underneath your hijab?’ question which we’ve quite often joked about yet forget that it’s the right opportunity to make da’wah. My Flip Doll portrays a hijabi on one side (normally in the mornings/outside the house) while the other side shows a girl without her hijab (night time/inside the house). Though I didn't win, it is the perfect tool for Islamic education!

In sha Allah, with your support, many more hijabi inspired products soon to come!

When my husband was offered a scholarship to continue his studies in the UK, my dream for Dzaltastic was to push it futher and promote my Hijabi inspired products to Muslims in the UK before we return to our home country.

However, as much as we plan, Allah is the best of planners, few months after arriving in UK, I suffered from a tragic miscarriage and had to cease all plans for Dzaltastic. Alhamdulillah, after recuperating, I started work again making hijab dolls, taking my time and slowly opened up my online Etsy shop.

The support has been wonderful from sisters all over the globe, MasyaAllah and I’ve been receiving numerous love and compliments for my work. To date, I have retailers in US, UK and Canada stocking my Muslim Heroes plushies, alhamdulillah.

However, the profit from my sales is still not enough to fund my ambition to join a trade fair or an expo. This crowdfunding project is set up to help me seek funds to showcase at a UK Muslim expo, namely the Muslim Lifestyle Expo (MLE) on the 1-2 August 2015 at the Ricoh Centre, Conventry, UK. The MLExpo team has kindly promised to hold a booth for me if I can get the funds by the end of the month. Help sponsor me as an exhibitor at my first Muslim Expo by pledging your donation to my project before then. Hurry, time is running out!

Here’s what the organising team of Muslim Lifestyle Expo has to say about the event:

"The Muslim Lifestyle Expo (MLE) will be the first Lifestyle event of its kind in the UK that brings together the best of the thriving global Halal economies in one central location. We’re creating an exciting platform for global business to showcase their products and services to Muslim and non-Muslim consumers in an all inclusive dynamic, fun and inspiring family friendly environment."

Most of my marketing and selling has been online and the MLExpo seems like a good place to try my hand at offline and face to face selling. There are plenty of art and craft fairs throughout the country, however, none directly targeting the Muslim community. This will be a chance for direct selling due to their family friendly environment (they’ll have bouncy castles, face painting, rides and story time, yay!) so a lot of Muslim children will also be at the event.

It’ll be a great chance for me to introduce my dolls to a wider UK Muslim audience and have a better understanding of the global Muslim community to help shape my products. As I’ll be leaving the country soon, it’s definitely an opportunity not to be missed. It’ll be the place to boost my global network, meet other Muslim entrepreneurs and other retailers who would be able to stock my creations.

And finally, it’ll be an honour to represent Creative Muslim Women at the event. Globally, there’s been a lot of support for creative women, but creative Muslim women dabbling in crafts are still under appreciated and rarely highlighted. Hopefully, it’ll be a chance to share the craft of a Muslim handmade artist and modern sewist, in sha Allah.

So where does your money go to? The money goes to paying for the exhibitor’s booth, accommodation, food and transportation for the 2 day event. Other portions will also go to setting up the booth, brochures, name cards and preparing more products for the event. We’ll also be putting aside the funds to pay off and reward you, our backers. And to round out the figure, all extras will go to future product expansion. 

Check out the reward deals! Donate some funds and get rewarded while you’re at it. Updated (11/5/2015) with a new Paypal link to also easily donate through Paypal. Just click this button:

Updated (14/5/2015): I'm now rewarding my £25 and £30 Excellent Muslim Pack backers by having their name exclusively printed on the back of my Muslim Hero plushies. This is a sign of appreciation for your support. I will contact these backer personally to ask for the names to be printed on the back.

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Even if you're not able donate through money or by sharing, your du’a and prayers for the success of this brand and project would mean a lot for a small business like mine.

For every donation, sharing and du’a made to the expansion of this little brand, I’d like to wish you ‘Jazakumullahu khairan’ and may Allah bless you with success in this life and the hereafter, Ameen.