Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. For the first time since the pandemic, Sarah, Rudi, and I resumed our New Year’s Eve movie marathon. (It was a mini marathon, but still!) We watched The Color Purple and Wonka — and enjoyed both — and ate Chinese food in lieu of pizza because Ella’s was closed. But at midnight, we were together, and that is what has been lacking since 2019.

2. Chris and Julie treat me to supper at a local restaurant the night after I get back to town on my own.

3. I baked last week and both cookies I made here were delicious and easy.

Salted peanut butter cookies (with thanks to Chris for his birthday request and Smitten Kitchen for coming through with a recipe, as I fully expected her to):

Gochujang caramel cookies (an Eric Kim recipe from the New York Times I’ve had open in a tab since December 2022 (not a typo), proving you really may eventually get back to it):

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world this week?

I’m working on my top ten books of 2023, but in the meantime wanted to share that Bout of Books is currently going on. You should join me in reading — as much or as little as you want — this week.

The Bout of Books readathon is organized by Amanda Shofner and Kelly Rubidoux Apple. It’s a weeklong readathon that begins 12:01 a.m. Monday, January 1st, and runs through Sunday, January 7th, in YOUR time zone. Bout of Books is low-pressure. There are reading sprints, daily Discord questions, and exclusive Instagram challenges, but they’re all completely optional. For all Bout of Books 39 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. – From the Bout of Books team