Groundedness and Peanut Butter Cookies

These are a few of my favorite things: baking peanut butter cookies for my kickass hair stylist and sweet inspiration Julia, Blackstreet and Dr. Dre turned up super loud ("I like the way you work it / No diggity / I have to bag it up."), Fourth of July long weekends in D.C. with Jenna and Ed, my super incredible hosts and friends (thank you!), my Monday night writers' group (Mary, Paddy and Jack = rockin'!), my new part-time baking gig at The New York Times-mentioned bakery, Sweet Art, (thank you so much, Reine ... I won't mess up the pastry cream this week), discovering new interests, from bellydance to rock climbing to the Palace of Wonders, and simply re-discovering how much fun being single can really be.