14 - Do Not Grow Weary in Doing Good

Do you constantly pour into your kids but are not seeing the fruit you'd hoped for? Or do you have goals that you're not achieving despite your hard work? It's easy to get discouraged on the long journey of parenting and home education. Listen in to how God sent us some encouragement in the midst of a 'woe-is-me-my-life-sucks' season. 

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Transcript

  📍 ​ Welcome to home is where the truth is. My name is Matt, and I'm Maeve, and we have five kids that we're trying to raise in the ways of the Lord. We want our kids to know the truth of their Catholic faith and how to defend it. This is an everyday job and a lifelong commitment, and it is so important that our kids learn this before they head out and leave our home into today's culture, which is why we've chosen to bubble wrap or.

Homeschool our children, and whether you're already homeschooling or praying about it for the future, let me tell you, it's an amazing life to let the Lord guide your kids' education and your family's adventures. So please join us for some relatable stories because we are sinners and we deal with temptation on a daily basis.

We get overwhelmed and stressed out just like you guys, but we do get some things right. Thanks be to God. So laugh along with us or at us, and glean some parenting wisdom, tips to deepen the family bond so that you can have a family culture that's centered on the Lord.   

All right, welcome to episode 4, 382 

We are loosey goosey and ready to go. Okay.

Actually, I think we're on 14 but we've lost track

it feels like 4, 372. Well let's talk a little bit about Easter 

so 

Yeah, it was full. Ours was so full. They had to open up. We have rafters in the back. We have upstairs that they only open  on about Easter and Christmas and those were even

were even full the overflow

Yes, overflow. And it's just so wonderful to see so many,

So many catholics show up once a

so many Christmas and Easter Catholics on Easter. It's just so beautiful. They're pretty dresses. Everyone's dressed to the hilt. And we still got our front, our first pew. We got there about 15 minutes early, like always. And the first pew is empty. 

Oh, yeah,

And we got it again, but this time families that usually would have sat in the back We had some up there in the front pew with us

Yeah, they're like  there's no place else to sit i'm like dude nobody sits up front

Yeah, come on in I mean usually is for the handicapped and the decrepit but hey just grab it

right We kind of nix that a long time ago. We didn't think about , the You Elderly folk that are  needing, they don't walk up. Yeah. They don't wanna walk up to a meeting. We just kind of overtook that front pew. Right.

Right. 

So now nobody takes it. I don't know if they're scared or what, but  how can you beat that front row seats?

People pay extra for that  

hmm. And, well, not at mass they don't.

but  everywhere else you go.

And this is the season where, father and the deacon, they go around and they throw that baptism water back at us.  We've been talking about, , do you get hit with the water? And so Matt and I came up with 

like a little bit of an upgrade. Okay.

we were brainstorming because,  we've been talking about how the Mass has been the same for 2, 000 years. And we're thinking, well, How do we bring portions of the Mass without ruining the sanctity of the Mass up to the 21st

Right, right, right. Because you don't want to be one of those people hollering,  Oh, the mass needs to come into the 21st century. No, no, no.  See, we have writings from about  100 AD that described the the mass or when they get, when Christians gathered. So we know they have been doing this for 2000 years.

So we don't want, we don't want to mess with that. We want to keep the mass. Like he said, the sanctity of the mass, like it is.

is. It's just some of the little details could be upgraded, I 

Like you were saying. You know, with that aspergillum. Aspergillum. That's the water

flinger, okay? 

like the little lollipop handled thing that you fling water, right? And so

And he needs to, like Matt was saying, sorry for

interrupting. No, go ahead. I'm used to it. 

He

needs to swirl it, okay? He needs to not whip it, okay? He just, you know that one hit, sometimes you see father and he gives it like a 

We're on like a lasso

yeah, like a swirl and  and we're thinking okay, that's the right idea because you're getting more of a like sprinkler

Yeah, but we need to re engineer that thing to have the flow of water as it comes out Be be  more fluid right to where it has  little grooves that just send it out like a sprinkler

send it

You know and it's just like you whip it around And man, it just throws this halo of water Out from from above

of water from above him. You know the thing where the

and the little lights things spin around his waist or whatever his yeah shoulders

hit

Yeah, I hit a button and the thing just starts whizzing around You know And you have  a little tube that goes into the bucket of holy water And it sucks it out as you're pressing the button. And so this thing is just throwing 

just throwing,

Throwing water.

I mean, you gotta probably take five steps and you've done the whole

five steps and you've  the whole church. And it would be so good if the mist, if it's like a mist.

Because then

heavy drops,

no heavy drop, just  a mist. So it's just , it goes out there and then it just kind of settles

kinda like a fog falls off mist. right.  It's kinda like the dew in the morning. You kind of have this  moisture on you, but it's not wet. 

Yeah. Or like it's, or you could just, okay, take it up one more notch. 

Holy water fog machine, baby.

Oh, yeah. That would be awesome. It's  big old bellow of smoke coming at you.  either you're scared or you're waiting for it. I don't know. One or the other.  And we were thinking too, so there's a ride at Disney, at Animal Kingdom. It's that big, as soon as you walk in, you see this giant tree.

It's called the Tree of Life. It's huge. And inside the ride is called a bug's life  And they've got the same figure down to where when you sit down in these rows They're built in   something happens and all of a sudden you feel a bug crawl underneath you 

okay, they spray out. Mist on you There's stuff under the seats the bugs  feel like they're crawling under you They even have  a stink bug and and it stinks

Yeah, when the, when, when on the screen, it sprays all of a sudden it sprays in front of you. You literally smell it. And I'm thinking they can incorporate that in the pew.

queue literally

Literally have like these little, I mean, instead of, if you want to go even further on their aspergillum, have these little spray nozzles right up front in front of each person in the pew.

He hits a button, boom, you just knocked out 3000 people in one spray. 

Okay. And you know what else they need in the pews? Okay. Well, we're just going to talk about upgrading the pews. Like you said,  there's the elderly and they,  aren't as mobile,  you know, that.  What's it called? The assist a lift chair? Where,

lift chair?

Where? Oh,

it's like a recliner, but it will stand you up.

It raises up and it'll stand you up. Okay, that, they could do that for the pew, for the elderly, but what about this? Imagine  the pew just kneels you down, like

like, 

It just tilts you forward. Yeah. And you're kind of  strapped in. So you're not going to fall.

so you're leaning.

Yeah. You lean, stand, sit, and you don't have to move. You just push a button. 

Like that machine at the YMCA where you're like,

like. Yeah. The full body chair massager just like locks you in there.  It's like,

No, not a chair massager at the Y. It's a machine where you lean forward and you do  extensions, back extensions, and then you lean back and you do, like, just that kind of engineering.  Yeah.

Well, I mean, that'd make it fun at

Yeah.  

I mean, 'cause there was a lot of standing and 

yeah, just some little upgrades that, yeah, that could be, , beneficial.

efficient. Yeah. Everyone feels that they've got, they've benefited, you know, especially when it comes to the. 

Holy water. 

when 

I think that's where they

lack. 

So this great analogy that I heard, cause I have this Bible app and they're talking about the tomb and how, when  the stone was rolled away. And he came up with a great analogy saying that the stone wasn't rolled away to let Jesus out.  It was rolled away to let man in. 

And you can apply that to our little upgrade here at the church. It's not about bringing Jesus closer to you. It's about bringing you closer to

to Jesus.

Exactly. Because, you

what,

If you show up for Easter and Christmas, I mean, you, you  that's holding you back from coming all those other weeks? I mean, I know what it is, it's all kinds of stuff, but  maybe these little interactive things.

like 

Things could just let man get closer to God, but, and side note

We do not recommend Disney.

We know these Disney references from many years ago before they went woke and  now They've taken all pronouns out. They won't use pronouns on little boys and girls anymore. They're programming is meant to spread transgenderism and So we do not we have boycotted Disney and haven't been there for years, but you might know these references If you've been to Disney, which we had many years doing that.



 Instead, take your family to the creation museum and the arc encounter. Wow. Instead of spending your whole retirement at Disney, go to a vacation that will actually fill your children with knowledge and wisdom and facts about the truth of our faith, about the truth of history, about the truth of creation.

It's fascinating.

fascinating.

Yeah, okay, so rewind a little bit before Easter back in Holy Week now The Lord knew that I needed encouragement. Okay, he had heard my sulking because I was feeling defeated, defeated in the parenting realm, which I'll talk to about that in a minute Defeated in marketing my book.

I had mentioned a couple of episodes a get a go about a newscast

That I got to be interview that I got to be on, but it dropped me, so it was kind of like that didn't work out. And we had the flu going around our house too, last, last week. Now on the parenting front. Y'all, I thought I was hitting it at every level. We took a pilgrimage to Our Lady of La Leche, which is the first Christian mission in the new world.

It was started in 1517 and it's also called America's Most Sacred Acre. Now this is in St. Augustine, Florida, which is the oldest city in America. Okay.  Pedro Menendez de la Villa is  Got off of his Spanish galleon, 

walked ashore, and the first thing they did was hold mass. And  there's a 500 foot cross ,  

 commemorates that.

And it's a beautiful place on the water. There's a little tiny chapel and all these statues that you can go around walking and saying the rosary. And on that property is our lady of La Leche shrine. And people come here to pray, to get pregnant. Cause it's Mary nursing the baby Jesus. In fact, the statue is her nursing Jesus.

It's so beautiful.  And so. I took the kids there, Matt was working, so he didn't come. And we also took a family from church with us who had never been. And so I'm thinking I'm crushing it on all levels, right? 

Going on a field trip, first of all. 

trip, boom, that's a winner. 

to St. Augustine, which you can't beat that.

Yep. Oldest city in America.

You're outdoors, you're at a very sacred place, full of history.

You got history. You got, we even went to confession. So you got the history of our faith. You got the history of America. You got shrines left and right statues.

And they have mini donuts down the street that are freshly made too. That that's all they could talk about. 

Well my kids were bickering and fighting and backbiting one another so much to the point of embarrassment. Like the other family, they were so sweet. They got along, the kids liked each other and ours were just complaining and miserable. In fact, I even had to tell one, you need to get back in the confession line.

Okay.

Do it again.

like, you know, we always, we, we have this thing where

We say, okay, I just got out of confession. Nobody make me sin. I'm not going to sin. I'm not going to sin. And we try to see how far, how long we can last  minutes. Okay. Maybe 10 minutes that we lasted that this time.  So

I was very,  defeated on all those fronts mentally, physically, spiritually.

And my friend just texts me out of the blue.  And she says, now we haven't texted in like three or four weeks. And she says, 

I just wanted to let you know that I've been listening to your podcast and it's amazing. 

, and she's like, Oh, do you want to chat? So I called her because I wanted to tell her immediately.

Oh my gosh, the Lord knew I needed that encouragement. I just needed some encouragement.  And she

I mean, don't, don't think that I don't give any here. It's just, she needed more than what apparently I was giving her. So,  

Right. I mean, you did, you were my sounding board. You helped me discipline the kids with that. We gave biblical discipline. We whipped out Bible

Oh, I took care of business, took care of business.  

And she said, you and Matt are so inspiring.  I was like, Oh, thanks so much. Like, it feels so good just to hear that someone is liking this podcast.

She's like, like it, I love it. So then her husband got on the phone something cool he said is he's like, we came across authentic and , I just know you guys are not  being hypocritical And so that really meant a lot because we don't want to come off as holier than thou We don't want because we are failures.

We are sinners like we are not  Great. Okay

I mean, all transparency. We took a shot before this. 

That's why we're

Okay. You can take that out. 

Well, I did say we were feeling loosey goosey because yeah, we're like uptight and we said we just wanted this podcast to flow. So if this flows, we're going to be like a do a shot before each podcast. 

Just yeah.

Okay. Transparency. Yes. But anyways,  do an abysmal job at best, especially with teaching our kids, , being good at influences on our kids.

struggle bus.

Oh, another thing  I want to say is I want to also piggyback on keep it simple sweetie from last week because I didn't tell y'all all the stuff that I used to do  that was not keeping it simple. So I have some confessions to make and I'll get to that later. 

But my friend's husband said this, he said, do not grow weary in doing well. 

And he didn't even say the whole Bible verse, but there's a Bible verse that we've used it with our kids. It's, they memorize this Bible verse in their preschool years and it's, do not grow weary in well doing for in due season you shall reap if you faint not. And that's kind of a mantra for homeschooling, is  it's years and years and parenting. Like you are going to get tired of teaching them the truth, of parenting them, of punishing the bad behavior, of teaching corrective behavior. 

And that's why I'm thinking  Lord, I'm calling out to him like we

not only worship on Sunday, we got, we're getting those sacraments, the history of the faith. I mean, the museum at the shrine had the casket of Pedro de Menendez de la Villas  and it had the Lord's Prayer in the Timaquan language.

the Timucuan 

the Timaquan are like the natives that were here first. 

The Lord's Prayer in a Timaquan  language.  , but my friend's husband was was waxing eloquent with his encouragement. And he said,  I wanted my kids to hang around your kids. So they learn manners and behavior. 

And we're like, what?  Are you sure about  

And that's the whole irony of it is I thought the same thing about his kids. I'm like, Wow, I actually  saw how much they respect you guys and , Oh my gosh, those kids are so good. And so it shows that it's so funny how we parents can be quick to see those misbehaviors and slow to see, or just, you know, hang at that high expectation and slow to see, well, okay, maybe people are having a bad day.

Like I said, we were, we were recovering from the flu.  He was still kind of sick. He didn't feel that great.

even want to go. 

go.

Yeah, it was an hour and a half drive. And like I said, we had another family. So, two kids were buckled in together for an hour and a half. Like, sitting cock eyed.  It could have been a bad day.

It was a long day. And the timing of their call from our friends was just the Holy Spirit. He, so he said I don't want to say their names, but I talk about them all the time on this podcast. What should we say their names are? 

Adam and Eve, I don't know. Because

They do have biblical names.

names.

Okay. Let's call him Adam. Adam said that we had encouraged him for years through the, through the last few years and everyone needs good friends  to encourage them. And then he said this, he said, 

I don't want to call her Eve. That's so

arms up 

Okay.  Eve  and I will hold your arms up in this good work, in this work you're doing. 

do 

will hold our arms up. Now, do you get that biblical reference, Matt, 

arms.

up the arms? 

arms?

Don't know. Okay. Like 

Okay. 

like 

Like a, like a battle raging.  

Like a battle  What the Egyptians the party in the Red Sea, I don't know 

You got the correct person. , it was Moses when there was, okay, good job on that. They were battling, I think the Philistines, they were fighting. And as long as Moses had his arms raised up, he

Oh, they would win

would win and he got tired. And so the people held his arms up. Is that such a beautiful 

metaphor of what encouraging friends can do?

Hold our arms

I would have  

Yeah, I know. So beautiful . So speaking of holding your arms up and they, they called us inspiring. I wanted to, I wanted to give two little nuggets of inspiration. Okay. Okay.  And then we'll come back to, I actually want to tell our friend Adam and Eve's story. It's very encouraging as well, but first I want to give a little source of inspiration.

So for all the parents that are out there who are caught up in raising their kids, homeschooling, taking to sports practice, what else?

Most importantly,  raising your kids in the faith, disciplining them.  What I want to tell you guys is don't lose yourself. Don't give up on yourself completely and don't give up on yourself physically either.

Because here's the thing, Matt and I we've talked about one of our things we love to do together and it builds our bond as we work out together. So we're still athletes. He's in his fifties. I'm in my late forties.

forties. Early, early fifties.  

And we can still call ourselves athletes. Like I said earlier, we didn't do  D one sports. We've just, we didn't even play sports in college. We've just always played sports for fun. 

I mean, I went to a D1 college. I just played like intramural sports.  Nothing that counted. Well, 

you went to a D one college after you got your little degree at your community

you. It's all the same. It's the same degree, Dave.

Okay.

Jeez. 

Okay.

he went to Florida, he went to University of Florida.

Go Gators. Okay, I went to, I'm a UCF grad.  Biggest college in the nation. , 

She's still trying to graduate  because you can't, you can't finish that

can't finish at UCF, UCF, you can't finish. , okay back on to the whole physical thing. The human body is amazing and the human body does show God's glory

And it's fascinating because people in their 40s and 50s can still be hitting PRs, which is a personal record.

Just about a week ago,  Matt said this. He was just, , pensive and saying,  you know, I wonder if I'll ever get another PR. when I

because I was, this was when I was sick and I'm just feeling miserable and my body ached and I'm realizing 

maybe this is it. This is the end of the line.

Mm hmm. Mm hmm.

so I was doubting myself for sure.

Well here, guess what folks?  Jemison just PR'd on his bench press at 51 years old. Okay.  

He  half

Not only did he PR, he beat everyone in the gym. Okay, he beat people half his age. 

Can we, can we say how much it was? I don't know. 

Okay.  315 pounds. That's all.  Nothing crazy. I mean, it's nothing crazy. I probably, I had another good 10 pounds left in me. I was just too tired. 

so, okay, so that's super exciting because he was just saying and that's as though as like God's encouraging him and saying, you know what? Yes, you're still going to PR and we only work out four times a week. . Where? And we eat normal. I mean,  we healthy but we still have treats.

have 

 One time.

Matt , you did a contest with your friend or an in gym contest a few years ago and your team name was dad bods or something.

something.

Oh, right. 

Oh,

okay, so,  So Maeve, being in her mid 40s, Right. So every year they do the, what they call the CrossFit Open and everyone has the same workout. We do it one every week for four weeks. Is it three weeks? Okay. Okay. And so you can register your name on the. Main website to actually log in your times and your your results.

Yeah. And then it pins it against everyone else in either your female category or your age category, whatever you're in.  And I mean, there's thousands, thousands of people and Maeve did such a great job that her and probably only what, six, seven others in our gym.  Made it to the quarterfinals, the cut. So she was in the top 25%?

I don't

I don't know really where they cut the quarterfinals.  I was like 88 percent tile. 

I 

a lot higher.  Or I mean a lot, in a lot lower.

Yeah, I was high up there.

Yeah. Yeah.

But what does that really mean? OK. It means that I get to do a bunch of harder workouts that I probably can't not even do, like heavier weights, bar muscle ups, all this, these gymnastic moves that I actually can't do. So, but

but you beat out a lot of people to make it to that point,

right. And I've only been crossfitting for like four years, but I am still getting better.

And so. Don't give up on yourself because you will still you if there's anything you like to do Just keep doing it and you're gonna keep getting better at it

Right. 

Yeah, one lady came up to me

in the gym and she's like Maeve. How old are you? And I'm like, well Do you want my Botox age or my real age?

want my Botox age or my real age?

Right, yeah.

She's 

like well, My daughter says she's always trying to keep up with you.

And then I told her, well, you know, Maeve's in her 40s. And the girl's like, no way, I thought she was in her mid 30s. I'm like, yep, that's my Botox age. That's when I start a Botox.

that's not a toxic, that's not a product. But okay,  have mentioned earlier that  clothing stylist.

 And I have mentioned earlier that I used to be a clothing stylist. I don't know if I mentioned that on here before, but I used to be a clothing stylist for a company called cabi and they have just the most awesome, amazing clothes. It's comfy. It's cute. It matches season after season because they use the same blacks in their pants and jackets, .

Well,



As anyone knows, trends come



and they go about every 30 years, stuff repeats. We've seen bell bottoms a couple of times. We've seen shoulder pads, you know, like the nineties is big now. But what some of my customers would say is, Oh, well, if you live, if you already live through the trend, you can't do it again.

And. I didn't really like that because it's essentially saying, well, I'm too old to wear that.  And so, no, I say embrace the trend that second time and look just as good, if not better in it the second time. But you know what, now you're older, you're also wiser and therefore more confident. so 

So, does that mean I get to peg the bottom of my jeans again like I did in middle school?

Tight roll? We called it tight rolled in the 

roll in the 

Hey, that's due coming back soon, probably.

soon

probably. 

You know, it's mom jeans now. . I've learned so much from back in the day when I was rocking those low rise jeans, right? Like, okay, ladies. Aren't we glad that trend is over? Okay, because

coming by.

I thought I've seen that already.

anything.

those high rise jeans. Those were hideous.

I like the high rise jeans. Cause you know what  on those low rise jeans. You got the muffin top hanging over those high rise jeans. , they keep the muffin in the pan. Okay.

I mean, they're basically like overalls without the shoulder straps.  I mean, that's how high they're going. I'm just like, this is ridiculous. 

Right, right. But I like it. Okay.  I wanted to give you guys some example. I need to fess up about where I didn't keep it simple, sweetie. 

You mean when we would go to the beach and we would literally fill the bed of the truck with all the toys and gadgets that we wanted to bring along until we realized Why are we bringing half our house to go to the beach? 

I mean, we

learned that quick. 

We already have to bring a tent. Surfboards, boogie boards, 

Cooler beach bag towels, beach toys.

let's not bring the three bulldozers .

Okay. To our six

Right? 



do you remember the first time we ever had Linda and Barney over for dinner in this house?  Okay. It was our first time basically having dinner guests.  I not only chose a recipe that I had never done before.  I chose a recipe that had these fall vegetables that I had never even cooked or cut.

It had  butternut squash mixed with six other veggies that had to be cut into half inch cubes.  Okay, so not only did I try that, very laborious recipe, I also sewed a slip cover.

To a

Right. I'm not even a  The 

I don't I'm not even a seamstress you guys the most I ever did was  so a throw pillow which is square

doily. 

No,

doilies are crocheted, honey

Oh,  Those

Those are very laborious I 

but literally 

I was sewing a slip cover for the chair because it was gray. It didn't match. So I was like, oh,

have to have a white chair. Yeah. 

So ridiculous, I mean I even had to download an ebook on  how do you do a slip cover? So that was not keeping it simple I used to decorate for every holiday

still do, what

No, 

I have cut way back. I only do easter and christmas And easter almost doesn't even make it out 

Don't we have fall stuff? 

The kids do that. 

I mean, even , St. Patty's day, even the little ones I used to, and

I still see some of my young friends or my mom, my friends that are moms of  their kids aren't  Too old or they don't have a lot of kids yet, and they still decorate for every holiday And then  i'm thinking, you know, she just hasn't burnt out enough yet. She hasn't figured it 

reason why I don't like to put christmas lights on the house because i'm over it 

Which is why I think I put the christmas lights up for the last two years, so Yeah, The more kids you add, now you're adding baby paraphernalia. You got baby stuff everywhere. So it just all came to a screeching halt with , the decorating. I chose my sanity over the leprechauns and the shamrock doilies.

Right.  Good call. 

Okay. What about you besides, okay, you said the beach. Is there anything else you could have kept 

to test simpler? Yeah, when we go camping, I take three days to load this camper. With. Living essentials that I'm, I've come to find out half the stuff we don't even use when we're camping.

And so I stopped doing that because that would drive me nuts. And not only that, it got me to the point where I didn't really look forward to going camping because it was so laborious to get all this stuff. And I would literally put a list together of everything that I needed.  I got these, , corn hole, , things, and I got lights for the awning.

I got fans. 

That. I got, you know, this and that. I got, you know, this and that. I got,

you know, all this stuff. And I'm like, what am I doing? You think we were moving by the time we got to the campground and we're unloading this camper. Looks like one of those clown cars, just never ending. stuff coming out. You think we're going to live there for a month and a half

it's only a weekend.

we're only there for like 3 days. 

yeah, I stopped

to, yep. Just a pair back and keep it

and keep it. No, Yeah. So, now it's just food

and underwear. 

leave our underwear in there.

So, well, yeah, that too  but if we don't have it,  hey, do without  will do without.  

Okay.  I want to share with you a story, and my friend said I could share it, because she hopes that it will encourage other people, and it definitely encouraged me. Now this is our same friends, and we gotta give a little bit of a backstory on them, so that you know all that she, they went through. 

 And finally had to take her homeschooling down to the bare bones, but I'll get to that in a minute. So,

Adam started his education to be a doctor when their eldest was like a six month old baby. 

She is almost 16 years old now. And he literally,

just

two weeks ago, finished everything, his residency, everything.

Praise the Lord, but wow, what a journey.  And if you fast forward to, or,  rewind, I guess, to the last four years 

living in miami while they were living here In orlando  where we live, right, which is about a five hour drive

for one residency pays next to nothing, but he had to be there for residency.

So he would only be able to come home. 

weekends. I mean, some weekends he would drive and only get to stay less than a day and have to turn around and

Go back.

And then, she had to get a job because there wasn't enough money. And she got a job teaching at a Montessori school.

So she had to quit, which is heartbreaking to stop homeschooling and go back to work. Luckily she had her kids at the Montessori school.  But it was still such a she would talk to me about how she just feels like she doesn't know her kids anymore, even though they were at the same school, she didn't have them in her class and it was just so heart wrenching.

And

 In this job, being a teacher  at a school is, you can easily, easily put in 60 hours a week with, when it comes to planning and grading. And  she's got four kids and , usually she

by herself for the most part.

yeah. We would have them over for a lot like holidays and there was one Thanksgiving where she was at her classroom, not only that whole weekend, but all of Thanksgiving, she couldn't even join us because she just had so much cleaning, planning, , she goes to,  two years of that, just wanting to homeschool, but can't and, , missing her husband and he's working all these hard hours and, you know, keeping the family together, keeping the family spiritually together and all that. And finally 

they get to homeschool again, they're going to get to be together.

And.  They're going to move six, the six hours down south. And

then a squatter comes in, in the house that they're moving out of.  She didn't even get to get  all her Montessori stuff out. And a squatter comes in and changed the locks.. So they're dealing with now legal issues.

She's moved six hours  across the state, a new career for her husband. So now, they're in, they, they can see the water from where they are. They got the salt air blowing through their windows, right? And their home is, is one of those homes on stilts.

So it's got three stories. And the

Right, because they live in the Keys now. 

 So now their bedroom, her and her husband's bedroom is on the top floor and that's all there is. So it's basically like an apartment above the kids. And

when they lived near us this is my friend I told you guys about who had made her home into a Montessori school and her kids slept in her room with her Because all the bedrooms were made of like into a classroom So this is the first time in years that they've had their own bedroom now They're back together the family's together and she just shuts down She said she could not homeschool  She couldn't.

She, after spending every holiday away from their family, trying to keep up with the classroom, now she's able to homeschool again, but she would be just upstairs in her room in paradise and could not get going.

get going.

And she said that she did nothing at all with the kids. She couldn't, she didn't even get out of bed till 10 or 11 some days.

But here's the thing. 

What do you think happened? 

What do you think happened in the homeschool?

But here's the thing. What do you think happened? What do you think happened in  Pretty much. They,  

Pretty much the the kids went on cruise control  They did school themselves.

She has like, she has a couple teenagers, a tween and a, I think a seven year old. And the, tween would help the seven year old because they had, , a couple of little subjects together. And the teens were just off and running.

They didn't even need her. Okay?  She was there if they did, but everything was okay. And she told me to tell that, that this it's okay to tell this story, to encourage any homeschool mom that are hard on themselves because we are, you know, none of any of these situations that she went through by themselves have the potential to derail your homeschool  moving,  career  dealing with

burnout. 

legal stuff.

Yeah, other issues in life.

Yeah. So any one of those can  bring homeschooling to a halt. I mean, that's the beauty of homeschooling is when you have something going on. Okay. It can take a back

Yeah, handle it.

You can take four, six weeks, two months, whatever. . Because even in its simplest form,  homeschooling still forms your child into a self starter, someone who takes initiative.  See, because here's the thing, education is not the filling of a bucket. It's the lighting of a spark.  And that's been attributed to Socrates and Plutarch. I mean, that's an old saying, 

but education is not the passive receiving of information.

it's like a quest when you can light that spark because they have that yearning for the knowledge.  That's when it's going to be like a forest fire in dry season.  That's what our friend Eve did is she simply helped them

light a spark.

 And as she relaxed up there in paradise and her new, Tommy Bahama furniture  with a little canopy over it, 

homeschooling

kept on going. 

And she broke out of it. She got the relaxation, she got the reset she needed. She was amazed to see the kids were fine and everything went on and, got to handle everything and settle her family.

mm hmm. It's kind of like the saying in the one line in Jurassic Park  where they made all the dinosaurs female and they're like, well, how are they going to mate?

And they're like, they won't.  Goldbloom said, life always finds a way.  And lo and behold,  you will find a way no matter  what is thrown in your path,  what tries to derail you,  things will work themselves out.  

Yes, and  not saying we believe in  Scientology or whatever Matt's quoting,  

was just a quote from a movie. That's

right, but I will say  Adam and Eve, our friends, are very faithful. They are very faithful and they knew that Jehovah God has them in the palm of their hand,  and whether it's that the 15 year journey of him becoming a doctor or  this this little journey.

I'm on of marketing of writing my book and marketing and doing this podcast is like Don't grow weary and well doing for in due season. You shall reap if you faint not 

And it's good to have friends

to hold up your hands, to hold up your arms too. 

because they get

Especially Matt's arms who can bench press 315.  

Watch out.  

right.

Hope you guys have a great Easter season. We'll talk to you next

Alrighty see ya.   📍  We  

 

hope you've enjoyed home is where the truth is. Would you like some more parenting pro tips and homeschool help? Well, then you should grab my book. Home is where the truth is. Why you can and should homeschool your child. Grab it for yourself or for a loved one who's thinking about homeschooling.

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