Autumnal Chopped Salad Recipe

The first weeks of school are here, and they have mothers like me pulling their hair out. What is it about this time of year that makes me so nuts? Isn’t this supposed to be like a refreshing start over point? New school year, new attitude right? A new chance to do your best, not get on the teachers bad side, not miss a single day of homework…

Instead my family becomes a manic mess! We put so much stress on the new school year and I can’t ever seem to break away from it. I always think “this is our year. This time around I’ll make sure:

• Every day Ava’s hair will be fixed in a cute fashion with a bow that matches her outfit.
• I’ll send monthly Teacher’s gifts to show our appreciation.
• The kids will bring creative and healthy lunches to school every day.
• Let’s sit down every morning to a great big breakfast and talk about the events in the upcoming day while we’re at it!

It is so much pressure we put on ourselves and it has me asking “Is it Fall yet?”  Fall the best time of year. Not only does it give the green light to start cooking up some of the most amazing food ever, but the weather is perfectly crisp, nature is breathtakingly beautiful, and it means my family will start getting back to its normal self. After a couple weeks into the new school year, we are getting into the groove of things. Standards that were set way too high in the beginning of September will start to come back down to earth, my family will be normal again and I like our “normal”.

• Ava heads off to school with leaves in her hair from sliding down the grass hill in front of the house while waiting for the bus. Bows are long gone by now, lost at school I suppose.
• Teachers Gifts? See you at Christmas. I’ll hook you up then.
• Lunch… Not eye rolling terrible. PB&J most days with fruit and munchies. Definitely nothing special.
• Breakfast will go back to Ava whining about oatmeal, Adrian whining about his cereal getting soggy, Leighton whining about not wanting breakfast, and me hollering upstairs to Julian that if he “comes downstairs one more time without his shoes on I’m making him go to school barefoot!”

Normal is nice isn’t it? In the meantime I’ll just turn to a little Fall teaser, my Is It Fall Yet? Chopped Salad. All of my favorite flavors from the Fall season mixed into an salad, out of respect for the fact that is technically still summer. The perfect Back To School dinner that I can prepare while the kids are away and quickly throw together in under 10 minutes come the dinner hour. These salads are just as good cold so I’ll have everything cooked and chopped and waiting in the fridge.