Boy Scout Court of Honor

Last night John’s Boy Scout troop had a Court of Honor to give the boys the awards that they have earned during the past few months.  John moved up in rank to Second Class.  He is actually very close to completing the First Class requirements and should get that advancement at the next Court of [...]

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An Easy, Yummy Chili Recipe

A couple of weeks ago, the girls helped me to make Wagon Wheel Chili as part of Caravan.  I based what we did on a recipe in Taste of Home’s Fun Food on p. 88.  It was so easy and yummy!  We also made “Mini Subs” to go with the chili, and those were also [...]

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A Beka Academy Week 6 Update: 5th Grade Mammal Poster

Today Brock finished his mammal poster for his 5th grade science class.  He had a lot of fun making it because he loves our guinea pigs so much!  He enjoyed being able to put pictures of our pets on his poster.  He still needs to put together an oral report for school, but he will [...]

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Three Years with Kara Joy Mincui

Three years ago Huang Min Cui from Huangshan, Anhui Province, China, became my daughter.  We changed her name to Kara Joy Mincui O’Brien because “Kara” means “pure,” and we were confident that God was bringing our family pure joy when He saw fit to bless us with her.  He has truly done that, and I [...]

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A New Fad

Last May, I gave John a set of Speed Stacks for his birthday, and, believe it or not, they just got put aside and never even opened–until this past weekend.  My brother and his wife were visiting and brought a couple more sets of stacking cups with mats and timers for the kids.  Well, this [...]

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More Verses by Kara

Kara had a couple more Scriptures to say before the end of her grading period later this week, so here they are:

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Wanted: Digital Camera Advice

I have never been terribly happy with my digital camera.  It’s ok, I guess, but it is somewhat disappointing.  The auto-focus is slow and often does not get the pictures in focus at all, and the pictures are consistently too dark.  So, I find myself taking a lot of shots just because I know most [...]

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A Beka Academy Week 5 Update

A few years ago, my mom and I teamed up to get A Beka’s music theory/flutophone course and the appropriate musical instruments for my nieces so they could get some exposure to reading musical notation.  At that time, I was able to get a set of 5 flutophones for a very low price.  I gave [...]

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Another Year of Caravan

This week the girls and I started back with our weekly Caravan meetings.  We had taken off most of the summer, but since the boys are getting back into scouts, it was time for the girls to start up again too.
We still have a couple of badges to earn from our first book, and then [...]

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Mandie and the Secret Tunnel Movie

Back in an earlier entry of The Prairie Family Chronicles dated June 9, 2008, I wrote a book review of  Mandie and the Secret Tunnel .  We enjoyed this book, and continued reading the first eight books in the Mandie series.  I knew at the time that we read the book, that a movie was [...]

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