Summer has arrived with all its golden light, long evenings, and the quiet hush of a slower pace. School is out, routines shift, and life feels just a little looser around the edges. It’s the season of bare feet and backyard dinners, library bags and lingering mornings. And in the Church, it’s also the beginning of something quietly beautiful: the season of Ordinary Time.
Ordinary Time doesn’t come with a calendar full of feast days or the built-in structure of Lent or Advent. It’s the long, green season, unhurried, uncelebrated by the culture, and often overlooked. But I’ve come to love this season more and more. It’s where real discipleship takes root. It’s not about preparing for something else. It’s about growing right where you are.
In a world that’s always rushing toward the next thing, Ordinary Time invites us to stay awhile. To let our faith stretch out and grow slowly. To recognize God not just in the high holy days, but in the everyday routines of meals, prayers, work, and rest.
So this summer, I want to invite you into something special:
The Slow Work of God: Embracing Ordinary Time at Home
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be sharing a series of reflections and practices to help you bring the beauty and depth of Ordinary Time into your home. These are not grand or complicated things, just small, intentional rhythms that create space for faith to flourish in the middle of your real, ordinary life.
Here’s what’s coming:
Daily Bread: Eating Together with Intention
How can our meals become sacred spaces of connection, gratitude, and joy?Praying the Day: Simple Rhythms of Summer Prayer
From morning walks to evening candlelight, we’ll explore ways to weave prayer into your summer days.Feasting in the Ordinary: Celebrating Saints & Seasons
You don’t need to go all out, just a few small, meaningful ways to mark the liturgical year in the heart of summer.The Green Grows Slowly: Teaching Kids Faithfulness
Because growth takes time, and our children need to see that the quiet work matters too.Sabbath & Play: Rest as Resistance
Let’s reclaim rest and delight as spiritual practices, not luxuries.Household Discipleship: Building a Rule of Life
How might your family’s rhythms reflect your values and call to live as followers of Christ?
Each post will include simple ideas for your home, theological reflection, and ways to get your family involved. Some will have downloads, checklists, or printable prayers to tuck into your planner or display on your kitchen bulletin board.
Because here’s the thing: Ordinary Time is not about waiting for something better. It is the better. It’s where Christ meets us in the everyday and makes it holy.
So join me. Let’s open our homes and our hearts to the slow, steady grace of Ordinary Time. Let’s live the green together.
Subscribe for free if you haven’t already so you don’t miss a post. And if you know someone who might love this series, send them this way, I’d love to welcome them into the journey.
With gratitude and green growing things,
Ashley
I'm really excited about this! I'm taking on the project of creating a binder for our family that walks through the church calendar by season and includes recipes, feast day traditions, ideas, etc to repeat each year. By trial and error we're finding the best practices for our family to live out the story of God's faithfulness each year. Your resources have been really helpful in forming this for our young family! I'm excited to build a home where our little girls can "taste and see that the Lord is good." :)
Oh I'm really looking forward to this series. The idea that Ordinary Time is not a waiting time (or a feasting time) hit different today. While there are still things to be done in Ordinary Time, it is different from the preparation of Advent and Lent and the feasting of Christmas and Easter. I think OT can be really formative for family life but we've been in a wild season of a brand new baby and a move to a different state so I feel like I'm missing out on some of what this season offers. I think this series will be a good encouragement of little things I can add into our routines to ground us a bit.
We have been WALKING to church each week (a thing I was very excited about our move here) and that rhythm has come to be a beautiful life line in the midst of unpacking, organizing, new library cards, new parks, new grocery stores, new new new haha and very little sleep. Something ordinary that feels so meaningful.