Blog Posts by Oprah.com

By Kate Rockwood

A bounty of sweet summer fruits tastes even better layered between flaky crust, and we showed you how making pie is, well, easy as pie, in the August issue of O Magazine. But if, like me, the heat of summer keeps you far from the oven, consider one of these scrumptious mail-order alternatives instead.

RELATED: Strawberry or Apricot Hand Pies Recipe

For Pie Addicts: Grand Traverse Pie Company
If the thought of choosing between cherry or berry makes your palms sweat, consider the Pie of the Month Club. For one season, six months, or a year, members tuck into a signature pie from this 15-year-old Michigan bakery each month. Some of the most popular pies include Cherry Crumb (Mario Batali called it "a religious experience"), Michigan ABC (grown-in-state apples, blueberries and cherries), and Opera House blackberry.
Reason for Seconds: Grand Traverse can customize a message on your pie--like with icing letters on a birthday cake--using pastry-dough cut-out letters.

Photo: ThinkstockBy Jenny Bailly

How to Get Rid of Bikini-Line Irritation

Those annoying red bumps that crop up after you shave are likely a case of folliculitis, an inflammation of the hair follicle. Unlike many other-itises, this one has wonderfully straightforward solutions. Upgrade your hair-removal tool kit with:

RELATED: O's Summer Beauty Survival Handbook

A salicylic acid scrub (like Bioré Pore Unclogging Scrub, $8): Use it on your bikini line two to three times a week (between shaves) to buff away the dead skin that can block hair follicles.

RELATED: 6 Quick Beauty Fixes for All Your Summer Skin Issues

A moisturizing shaving cream: It will soften both your skin and your stubble to make shaving less irritating.

RELATED: 5 Steps to Getting Gorgeous Legs

A clean, sharp, razor: Look for one with four blades (you'll get a close shave without pressing too hard), and toss it after a few uses (when it's dulling and may be harboring bacteria).

RELATED: 15 Treatments

Photo: ThinkstockBy Corrie Pikul

It's the middle of football season, and the head trainer for the New York Jets is pacing around his office. He's tried every drill he can think of, but his players just can't seem to focus. The phone rings. It's a woman--a hypnotherapist, she says. She thinks she can help the players get their heads back in the game. The trainer is familiar with strangers telling him how to improve his team--this is New York, after all--and he tactfully puts her off. That trainer had no idea what he was up against.

RELATED: Big Career Questions: How Do You Find Your Purpose?

A couple of months later, Donna Dannenfelser, Ed.D., a Long Island housewife-turned-therapist, is counseling pro football players in her home while her kids watch TV. The team starts turning things around. Fast forward a decade, and Dr. Donna, as the players call her, is advising high-profile patients and working as a supervising producer on a show based on her career (Necessary Roughness, Wednesdays on USA).

Photo: Jason LoweBy Lynn Andriani

Me, I like to reach for a cold bottle of iced tea mixed with lemonade when I'm feeling wilted by the summer heat. If I were Spanish, though, after waking from my afternoon siesta, I'd probably reach for a bottle of... gazpacho?

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Yes. Though technically a soup, gazpacho is thirst-quenching enough--and, if you puree it finely, liquid enough--to be drunk straight from the bottle, which is how many Spaniards enjoy it, says Claudia Roden, who spent years researching her new 624-page doorstopper, The Food of Spain. Roden told me gazpacho is so popular in Spain, even supermarkets sell it by the bottle. For the rest of us, though, it's easy enough to make at home. And if you're so inclined, I've found the perfect gazpacho containers (funnel required).

RELATED: How About a Charred Spanish Ham and Cheese to Go With Your Gazpacho

Roden says:

1. Use very ripe tomatoes
2. For the bread that helps thicken the soup, use a hearty

Photo: Thinkstock"The best thing for being sad...is to learn something," said T.H. White in The Once and Future King. This has nothing to do with academic drudgery and everything to do with the fact that mastering a technique, sharpening a skill, doing something you didn't know how to do before, proves anything is possible. Here are 25 ways to brighten up those little gray cells.

RELATED: 9 Homegrown Tricks for Cheering Yourself Up

1. Memorize one good joke.

2. Learn how to land a triple lutz...or maybe just how to skate backward.

3. Teach yourself not to take the bait the next time a loved one starts pestering you.

4. Master Italian (or American Sign Language, German, Spanish, French, Pig Latin...)

5. Have a kid show you one foolproof magic trick.

RELATED: 10 Ways to Find Happiness

6. Perfect your margarita-making technique.

7. Enroll in a bookbinding course.

8. Read everything by a single author whom you've been meaning to get to for years. Faulkner? Melville? Auden? Colette?

9. Knit yourself or

Photo: Roger NeveBy Jenny Bailly

Trust us: It's way too hot to wear pants. Here's how to get your legs (and arms, and chest) ready for the season's skin-baring outfits.

A Spotless Décolletage
A retinoid cream-either prescription, like Retin-A, or over-the-counter (look for retinol in the ingredient list)-will lighten discoloration and soften rough patches caused by sun damage. Two to four treatments with a KTP laser or intense pulsed light (IPL) can more dramatically minimize both the brown spots and redness caused by UV exposure. (Cost: At least $500 per session.) A fractional nonablative laser, like the Fraxel Dual, greatly improves not just the color but also the texture of the skin. You'll probably need at least two treatments. (Cost: Around $1,000 each.)

RELATED: 13 Beauty Treats That Will Keep You Cool All Summer

Silky Legs
A rich shaving cream and a four-blade razor (try Bic Soleil Bella, $7) are all you need to get smooth legs for at least a day or two. Laser treatments can drastically

Photo: ThinkstockBy Lynn Andriani

Maybe you follow baseball. Or maybe you find yourself following someone you love--who happens to love baseball--to the nearest stadium. If so, you might have noticed that Major League ballpark food has left the traditional peanuts and Cracker Jacks in the dust.

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I kept hearing that the gourmet offerings at many of the country's newer stadiums threaten to steal the show, so I asked around and found six foods baseball fans can't get enough of. Even if your interest in America's pastime is limited to the endearing if ragtag group of dogs named for the Yankee shortstop, you'll want to try these recipes and make a playoff-worthy version of them at home.

RELATED: Stay Healthy in the Bleachers

Ballpark: AT&T Park
Team: San Francisco Giants
Must-try concession: Crazy Crab'z, center field
What to order: Dungeness crab sandwich with mayonnaise and tomato, served in a grilled garlic butter sourdough baguette.
Make it at home:

Illustration: Marisa MarchettoBy Suzy Welch

About a year ago, I bumped into a friend whose daughter, Amanda, used to drive me a little crazy when she was in high school. Not because she committed any of the typical teenage transgressions but because she was perfect. She got great grades, made captain of two teams, played violin in the school orchestra, and was completely down-to-earth and cheerful to boot. So it was with trepidation, as the mother of mere mortals, that I asked after this girl-by then a college graduate working at a well-known company.

"Oh my God, she is terrible," came the grief-stricken reply. "Her life is in ruins. She has a bad boss."

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Instantly, my heart broke for Amanda. She had joined the ranks of humankind.

"Well, it happens to all of us," I told her mother sadly.

"I know-I went through it," she said with a sigh. "But I just quit and married Bill. Amanda doesn't have a Bill. She has only herself."

Exactly. Some of the most successful careers