SR 861: Back to School 2024: Prioritizing What Truly Matters – Aby Rinella, Part 1

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At the end of the day, when you distill your entire life down and

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every experience and everything you’ve done, what it comes down to

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is your love for God and sharing that with others. And

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that’s ultimately what it’s about. Hey, everyone,

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this is Yvette Hampton. Welcome back to the Schoolhouse Rocked

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Podcast. I am back this week with Abinella, and you

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guys might hear that my voice is a little bit raspy.

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Do I sound raspy to you, Aby? You don’t right

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now. No. No, Garritt did. Yeah,

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Garritt is. We’re both getting over head

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colds. And so last night, it was so funny. I called my

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mom, and she was like, I’m sorry, who is this? That’s

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funny. She knew who it was, of course, because of caller id,

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but, yeah. So if my voice sounds a little different, it is because I am

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just getting over a cold. And tis the season

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for headcount allergies, too. Yeah. I feel like I woke up this morning

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and hit, and my daughter’s like, it’s not even fall. I’m like, but

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things are happening. I was just gonna say fall allergies. But here’s the

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thing, Aby. It is not fall yet. It is still summer. I know we

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haven’t even started our school year, but I know Hobby Lobby has fall

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things, so it’s Hobby Lobby’s fault. Falls the best time

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of the year. I love it. I got so cold last night sleeping that I

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had to put an extra blanket on. Like, tis the season.

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How cold is it where you are already? Well, I mean, you can make fun

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of me, but it’s getting into, like, you know, 50, 51 at

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night. And so we leave the whole entire house open, and then you

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wake up in the morning and you’re like, this is colder than it is in

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the middle of the winter in the house. Yeah, I’m with you. I love fall.

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It’s my favorite season, and it’s the one I look forward to the most, so.

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But we’re not here to talk about fall. Well, we kind of are here to

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talk about fall, because we are. This is our 2024

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back to school episode. Yeah. We’ve done this every year for,

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I don’t know how many years. A lot of years. A lot of years. And

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it’s been so fun. This is one of my favorite episodes to do, where we

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just talk about what we’re looking forward to in the school year. We’ll talk at

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the end of the week a little bit about curriculum and what curriculum we’re using,

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because Aby and I get asked this question all the time. People

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always ask us, what curriculum do you use? Or what should I use for this?

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What should I use for that? And so not that what we’re using is what

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you should use. You’ve probably already chosen your curriculum for the year.

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If not, that’s okay. If not, that’s okay. It’s not too late. No, it’s really

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not. No. But we will share with you what we’re doing, but

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just bring some encouragement this week. So we’re excited to do this. But before

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we get into our conversation. I was gonna say there’s a sponsor, right?

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Yes. Yes. Yes. Let’s hear it. Our sponsor is. Who do

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you know? Aby. I’m guessing it’s, wait for it, BJU Press.

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BJU Press Homeschool. We love BJU Press

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Homeschool. We’re actually using some BJU Press Homeschool curriculum this year, which we will talk

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about again at the end of the week. But if you yourself are looking

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for great christian curriculum, check them out at

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BJUPresshomeschool.com. They’ve got something for

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everyone. It’s one of the things I love about them. I had a need

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for a specific subject this year for Lacey, and we looked through all the

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different things, and she chose BJU Press for it. And

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so that’s. And you don’t have to use all of BJU Press. You can pick

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and choose. That’s what I kind of. I think people think, like, you have to

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do the whole box deal and you don’t. You can pick, like, one subject with

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them. Right. But lots of people do. I mean, lots of people love to just

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say, okay, I’ve got a third grader. I want to do all third grade BJU

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curriculum, and that works great for them. And so you guys are in charge. Of

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your own homeschool, right? Right.

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You are in the driver’s seat. So if you are looking for

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great textbook curriculum, BJU Press is fantastic.

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We love them. Check them out at BJUPressHomeschool.com.

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Well, Aby, man, it has been quite the summer. We. We.

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Let’s. Let’s do a really quick summer in review. Oh, gosh,

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it has been a whirlwind of a summer. As a

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matter of fact, this episode. We’ve been trying to record this episode for probably

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six weeks at least. And it. It’s just

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been one thing after another for our family. I’ve had two

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emergency trips to California. My mom has had some health issues

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and health scares. And so, you know, one of them was my sister

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called me on Sunday and said, I need you to come now. So I hopped

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on a plane in Tulsa and was there the next day.

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And the first trip before that, the girls and I drove. It was kind of

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another similar phone call where my sister said, I need you to come. And my

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sister’s amazing. She and my niece take really good care of my mom

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whenever she’s having health issues, and so. But it’s

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a lot for them to shoulder on their own. So right back in May, it

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was like right after the school year ended, and my sister called and said,

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I really need your help. So the girls and I got in the car and

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drove to California and drove

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back. We took three days to drive there. Some people drive it in a day.

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That’s insane. It’s ridiculous. It’s like 21 hours of drive time,

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which for us is like a 25 or 26 hours drive with

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stocks. Right. So, yeah, we split it into three days because for the girls night,

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it was too much to drive. Yeah, I would say maybe if you have someone

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else driving back and forth. Yeah. Yeah. So we did that, and then just, you

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know, Lacy started playing volleyball this summer, and she is

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loving it. It is so much fun. So, first real sport, real

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team sport that she’s ever played. She did gymnastics as a little kid. So did

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she do it through, like, a rec team or. So she did, yes.

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She did our city rec league and loved it. That was kind of the first

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intro. She’s like, I think I want to try volleyball. And she’d kind of played

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with friends, you know, just goofing off, like, in their backyard. But she had never

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actually played volleyball, so she did the rec league first,

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and then there’s a homeschool team. What? Oh, you

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guys are so blessed. There are, I think, three,

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at least three homeschool volleyball teams in the Tulsa

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area. Rub it in. I’m sorry. It’s okay. It’s

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amazing. I know. So, yeah, she went to

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volleyball camp, and then now she’s playing

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for the Netforce Falcons. So cool. It’s so cute with

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her little uniform, you know, her little jersey. It has her name on the

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back of it. It’s so official. It’s so cool. That’s cool.

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So they play other homeschool teams. Like, and, you know, even, like, we’re going to

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Arkansas next week, I think, for them to play, and

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then that’s. Like a whole other state.

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Yeah, but it’s just right next door to us. I mean. Okay, I’ll get out

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my map and look later. Yeah, we’re not going to New

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York anyway. Yeah. So that’s been fun.

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We spent some time in Tennessee. We went to the culture proof conference. Garritt

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and I did a session there and showed the movie, and that was with Will

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and Miki Addison, and that was fun. We got to meet some amazing people there,

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and it was just so sweet.

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I got to meet a listener. Her name was Amber. And

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it’s such a blessing to me to be able to meet people.

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I mean, we met several people who listen to the podcast, but to just have

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people come out and say, hey, I’ve listened to the podcast, and it has

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really changed my perspective on homeschooling or, you know, this is what the Lord’s done

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through it. Those are the things that keep us going, really,

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honestly. And so. So it was just a sweet time in

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Memphis. We were in Memphis, and it was a great conference. I love the name

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of the conference. Culture proof. Yeah. Well, such a great name. Yeah. If you

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haven’t listened to the culture proof podcast with Will and Mickey Addison, it’s

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fantastic. So I love them. Yeah. Yeah. It was fun, too, because it was

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a family life conference. It was not

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a homeschool conference, though. We did a homeschool session

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there, and like I said, we showed schoolhouse rocked.

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But it was a so family conference. So they talked about.

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Because that’s what homeschool’s about. Right, right. I mean, family first. Home

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first. Yeah. What was interesting is there were a lot of grandparents

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there, which I thought was really, really cool. So, anyway, it was fun,

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and so, yeah, this summer, we have only been swimming one time,

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and we love to swim, but it’s just been crazy.

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And now we start back to school next week.

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You’re starting next week? Yeah, we start back next week. Oh, you didn’t tell me

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that. Yeah, I’m telling you. Well, that’s exciting. I didn’t realize you

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were so close. Yeah, yeah, we start back next week. Very cool. Speaking

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of swimming, we just watched a movie. I’m gonna tell everybody because everybody’s looking for

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good movies nowadays. Oh. And it’s called, like, the young

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girl who. I don’t know what it’s called. So now nobody’s gonna know.

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But it’s about the first girl to ever swam the.

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The canal. The channel. The channel between, you know, this place and

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that place. England and prince. I don’t know. Okay.

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It was unbelievable. But here’s the kicker. We were at somebody else’s

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house, and they had Disney plus, so I don’t recommend getting Disney plus. In fact,

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I would boycott Disney at all costs. Yeah, but keep an eye out for it

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coming out on something else. Is it a Disney movie? Well,

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I don’t. I don’t know how. I don’t know how Disney plus works. Cause we

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don’t have it. Cause we don’t support them. But there were commercials, so I don’t

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know. We were at someone else’s house, and we just found the movie, but. So

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we just need to google the girl who swam. I think it’s called, like, the

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young woman who something. The channel who swam

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the channel. Who. I don’t know. Just. You guys will find it.

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Sorry. I will try to put

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a link to it in the show notes. We will find it. Yes. Okay. I

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will not try to promote things that I don’t know anything about. All I know

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is that we watched the movie and we started it at, like, 1030 at night,

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which is probably why I know nothing about it, because I was half asleep. But

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I do know that it was good and it was clean. It was super clean.

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It was super good, and it was a true story. So. Okay. Yeah. Nice, you

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guys. You have Google these days. You’re gonna find that movie in, like, google it

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seconds. Just ask Siri. She’ll tell you, for sake. You’ll find that movie in 30

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seconds. Y’all already know what it is. You already just looked it up while we’ve

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been talking about it. Oh, my word. So other than watching this movie

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about a girl swimming. Yes. What did we do this summer? Yeah. How was your

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summer? We had a. It was a while. Spring is really busy because I

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was speaking at several different conferences, and then.

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And then we got the word. So Jesse’s dad

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has had dementia for about ten years, and he just started really going downhill.

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So we spent a lot of weekends in a row just saying goodbye

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to him, spending as much time as we could with him. And then he.

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He passed away. So I spent a week with his mom.

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Um, just. It was that. That was a God’s plan,

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right? Like, man makes his plan, and God directs his path. And this summer, we

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had a lot of things planned that, um, didn’t get done

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because we were doing family and the most important thing. And it was incredible. He

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was the most godly man I’ve ever met. He was such a. Just

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a legend and an example. And, um, it was just a

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blessing to be able to. It made. It made everything that

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we live for and everything we believe in very real because we watched this

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Mandez go to eternity, and there was a peace that I

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cannot. I’ve never felt such a peace in a room anyway,

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so we did that and then, and then we had some of

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our nonprofit events where we, you know, so it was just a busy summer, but

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really good. It was like all really good things.

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And then we start school Wednesday. Yeah, that’s crazy. But I tell the

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kids, even though we’re starting school, we’re not like, one day a week we’ll still

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hike or go paddleboard or go boat or go swim. And then if there’s,

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like, things going on, I’m not going to be like, no, you have to do

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your math, even though all your friends are still on summer break.

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It’s just that I’m like, if we’re, if we’re at home anyway, we

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might as well get started. And the reason we start so early is then it

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allows us to take off a lot of time in the fall because of our

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lifestyle or throughout the school year. Um, it just. I just like

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being able to make our schedule how it works for our family. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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quality math lessons for my children. If you’re looking for a great

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online math program, visit ctcmath.com.

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that’s ctcmath.com.

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Are you looking for a homeschool curriculum that goes beyond textbooks and

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love for learning with Apologia. Discover Apologia

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today apologia.com. We are

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back with Aby. Aby, before the break, you

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were talking about and I didn’t prepare you for this question. I didn’t prepare you

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for any questions no, we did not.

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But before the break, we were talking about our summers, talked about

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how Jesse’s dad passed away and how he was literally just the most godly man

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you had ever, ever met. And as this summer has progressed and

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I’ve been talking with you and praying for your family and just realizing, like, what

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an incredible legacy he left for his family.

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And that’s really one of the things I want to talk about this week. It’s

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the most important thing I want to talk about this week because,

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you know, when he went to eternity to be with his

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savior, God was not like, so did you do

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math with your kids? Right. You know, how well

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did you do in geometry? You know, how, how many wars do

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you know about? You know, what are the dates? You know, what’s the date of

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World War one? Yeah. None of that stuff matter. No. And what we

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noticed is, as phone calls were coming in and texts of people just saying, I

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mean, what, what was amazing is when he passed, man, I can try to get

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through this without crying, but as when he passed, it was unbelievable how many people

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texted and said, man, he changed my life. He made such an impact on my

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life. And this is what we kept hearing. He taught me how to love Jesus,

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and he taught me what it was to be a man. Like, we got so

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many notes and Jesse’s mom did of that, and it was never, yeah, you’re

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right. It wasn’t. Man, he was so successful in business or

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he was such a well educated man. It was, he taught me how to love

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Jesus. He taught me what it, what meant to love Jesus to love others. And

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he taught me what it meant to be a man. And it was so incredible.

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Like, if you could just distill his entire life, and he was hit a lot

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of life. Like, he was one of those guys that did everything. He was always

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on the go. He was this wild and crazy guy.

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And that if you could distill it all down, is what we heard

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is he loved God and he loved others, and he shared that.

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And that ultimately, what was it? And the other thing we noticed is he was

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losing his mind, you know? So all

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of his knowledge started to go away, but his wisdom

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didn’t and the Holy Spirit didn’t, which is what was so interesting. Like,

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he wouldn’t even remember who we were. Like, he

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wouldn’t remember who I was. But he would remember him

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from his childhood. He wouldn’t remember

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yesterday or how to make a piece of toast, but he would remember

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Bible verses. And it was just so amazing to really go

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at the end of the day, when you distill your entire life down

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and every experience and everything you’ve done, what it comes down to

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is your love for God and sharing that with others. And

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that’s ultimately what it’s about. Yeah,

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it is. I can’t help but think of my life verse. I’ve shared this on

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the podcast many times, and. And it is the

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first. I think about it almost daily, and I

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keep just focusing on this verse. It’s ecclesiastes 1213 and it’s the

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end of the matter. All has been heard. Fear God and keep his

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commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. That’s verse 13. And then verse

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14 actually says, for God will bring every deed into judgment with every secret

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thing, whether good or evil. But the beginning of that says the end of

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the matter. Right? Right. That’s it. The end of the matter. Right. All’s been heard.

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Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. Right.

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And what is the greatest commandment? Love him and love others. I mean, when

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he distilled that down, and that’s what I saw. That’s what I saw,

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and that’s what my kids got to see. And that helped me

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refocus, like, when you literally see it. And I was blessed

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enough to be the one that was there at his bedside.

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And it was so crazy at the end to actually see someone go from

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the flesh and blood to eternity. Like,

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none of his stuff, none of it. It was just. It was him going to

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be with Jesus. And it really made all of that real, and it

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really made me go. As I’m raising my kids,

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they are going to have at the end of the matter, like, at the end

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of the day, and what is it that I am pouring into them?

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Like, who will they be on their deathbed? Will it be all of their

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accolades and their successes and their grades and their this and that and not that?

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Those things are important because part of that is what God calls us to. Like,

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God used Tony through those things. But at the end of

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the day, what’s the most important thing I’m pouring into?

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Yeah. Because that’s what will be left, you know? Yeah. And

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the legacy that he left for Jesse, your husband. Right.

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And the legacy that Jesse is leaving for you and for your kids.

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Right. You know, it’s just. It’s generational. Totally. It

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is. It is. Tony knew what was most important. He passed that on to

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his son, who’s passing that on to his son and his daughters. And it just

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is amazing to me to look at that. You know, when my mom

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was in the hospital this summer, I spent a week sitting literally

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in the hospital with her pretty much all day, every day. And

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what she wanted most, you know, that there was a tv in the room and,

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you know, there were other things to do. And all she really

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wanted to do was just read the word of God together. And she was

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kind of out of her mind for part of it. But even, like, she couldn’t

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remember her name. She couldn’t remember her birthday, but she would

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say, can you just read the Bible to me? The Bible, right. And it’s just

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amazing to me how the Lord uses his truth that way.

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Totally. And so as we’re homeschooling and as we’re thinking through

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this new school year, and, you know, again, we’ll talk about curriculum

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and stuff, but. Right. Nothing else

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matters. Right. You know, the end of the matter. Right. Is.

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Yes. Fear God, love God, keep his commandments. That’s it. That’s the whole

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duty of man. And God will use things like

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careers and academia and education to do those things,

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but those are not the first things. And if we pursue those things without the

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first thing, um, like. Like the word says, unless the Lord builds the house,

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the builder’s labor is in vain. And in psalm 127. And it’s like, if we’re.

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If we’re pursuing the academics without that first thing in

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mind, right, then it’s in vain, you know? Then. Then at the end

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of the day, there’s nothing going to be left, because that’s not the stuff that

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matters. That’s just the stuff that God could potentially use for the bigger

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picture. Right. I’m going to read this thing that is just one of my.

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It’s something I read at the very beginning of every year. I should probably read

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at the beginning of every week in my home school. But it’s written by. Let

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me see if I can find the gal’s name. Carolyn Cain. And I don’t know

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who that is, but it says, if I have learned. And this just reminds me

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of, like, what we’ve been talking about and. And my father in law. Like, at

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the end of the day, if I have learned my abcs and can read 600

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words per minute, but have not been shown how to communicate with the designer of

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all language, I have not been educated. If I have memorized

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addition facts, multiplication tables, and chemical formulas, but have

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not been disciplined to hide God’s word in my heart, I have not been

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educated. If I can recite the Gettysburg address and the preamble to the

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constitution, but have not been informed of the hand of God in the history of

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our country. I’ve not been educated. If I graduate with a

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perfect 4.0 and am accepted at the finest university with

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a full scholarship, but have not been guided into a career

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of God’s choosing, for me, I have not been educated.

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However, if one day I see the world as God sees it

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and come to know him, whom to know is life eternal and

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glorify God by fulfilling his purpose for me,

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then I have been educated. And to me, isn’t

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that incredible? I’ve never heard that before. Yes. And it isn’t saying that those things

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are wrong because God can use them. It’s just saying that

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that’s not the most important thing in education. You know? Isn’t that

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amazing? I read it at the beginning of every year because that’s what we’re doing.

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That’s what education is, is it’s pointing our kids to him so that

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when we are lying on our deathbed, what’s left is, did we love

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God and did we love others? And that’s going to be the legacy we leave.

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Yeah. Yes. Oh, that’s so good, Aby. Well, that’s the perfect

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way to wrap up this episode. We’ve got lots more to talk about. This went

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by so fast. I love just talking with you. We’re going

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to come back again, and we’re going to keep talking about, you know, what really

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matters this, this school year. Just keeping our focus

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on Jesus, how to do that, some ways to just

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stay focused on him and just bring some more encouragement to you guys. So

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thank you for being with me, Aby, love chatting with you. And

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thank you guys so much for being with us. We are so grateful for you.

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I cannot even tell you what a blessing you are to us

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just knowing that you guys are on the other side of this microphone. The emails

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that you continue to send, the messages that you send, the reviews that you leave

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for the podcast, all of that stuff is such an encouragement.

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And we’re here to encourage you and to serve you. So if there’s any way

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we can always feel free to send us an email, you can email us at

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podcast@schoolhouserocked.com. if you have not left a review

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00:21:54,770 –> 00:21:57,946
for the podcast, would you take just a few minutes to do that? We would

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really appreciate that. That helps other people, too, find it and to know why they

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should listen to the Schoolhouse Rocked Podcast. We love you guys.

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Have a great rest of your day. Stay tuned to the very end to hear

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a clip of what’s coming up next. And we will see you back here then.

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Bye.

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Even in our homeschool journey, like, now that we’re farther along,

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I’m realizing all the things that I thought were so important when

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I first was in kindergarten isn’t important. I remember how much

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time I spent on certain units, and now I ask them and

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they’re like, I don’t even remember that, right. And I’m like, wow, that was a

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lot of work and money. And it just helped me go, you know what? Those

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aren’t the things I mean, yes, they matter. We’re called to give our kids an

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excellent education because we want to do everything in excellence. But we hold such high

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mass over the things. But you know what they do remember? Sitting and reading with

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me, waking up and having breakfast, just being together and

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making memories and pointing them like, I just think about this

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summer. Every plan we had was derailed. They had the

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most impactful, educational, incredible

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summer ever. This summer, because it was God’s plan, not mine.