After three weeks of vacation, it’s hard to settle back into the ordinary. Dinner doesn’t make itself, and the dishes pile up. Despite all the laundry we did on the road, there were half a dozen loads to do when we arrived home. There are bags and boxes to unpack and routines to re-establish. And I’d rather just go on vacation again so I don’t have to finish unpacking.

But when I think back on our three weeks, and the visits with six of our children’s seven living great grandparents, it’s the ordinary that I cherish.

The girls playing with the dollhouse at my grandparents’. The way Daniel took to the toy toolbox at Great Papa and Grandma’s. Watching the kids take turns pushing Great Grandma around in her wheelchair and eating doughnuts Great Grandpa bought them. The walks down to Papa’s barn and the messes we made in Grandma’s kitchen. Staying up too late swapping parenting stories with my cousins.

Each moment so ordinary but extraordinarily precious.

So I pause to give thanks for a new mug in the midst of a busy morning, because I know I can’t be stressed and thankful at the same time.  I take a moment to hold the “baby” when he asks, to bundle up everyone so they can play in the mud and the snow for five minutes until they are freezing cold, to make peppermint tea to warm them up.

Because these tired, busy ordinary moments? They are precious, too.

^{{Five-Minute Friday on a Wednesday: “Ordinary”}}