Preheat the oven to 375.

If you're like me and always forget to remove your eggs from the fridge ahead of time to get them to room temp, place eggs in a bowl in the sink and allow hot tap water to slowly run over them while you prep the other ingredients. Then just let them sit in the bowl of hot water until you're ready for 'em.

Cut each stick of cold butter into large chunks (about 5 chunks per stick) and place in a glass (not ceramic!), microwave-safe bowl or measuring cup - Pyrex is my fave to use in the microwave! Heat in the microwave for 30 seconds - you want part of the butter to be melted but NOT hot, and the other part of the butter to still be solid but a little soft. 30 seconds always works for me & my microwave.

Pour butter into mixing bowl & begin to cream with a stand or a hand mixer. Add in sugars and cream together on medium speed for 2-3 minutes.

While the butter & sugars are creaming together, pour 3 c flour (leave that other 2 tbsp for later!), baking soda, and salt in a separate bowl and gently mix together with a whisk, and then set aside. Don't be tempted to add these individually into the mixing bowl. Doing it this way ensures they don't get over-beaten into the batter & cause tough cookies. Boo!

Add in vanilla & egg to the creamed butter and sugar until egg is combined, scraping the bowl to make sure everything evenly mixes together.

Slowly add in the flour mixture to the creamed butter, and mix together until just combined - this shouldn't take more than a few seconds.

Gently add in the chocolate chips.

Now, for a silly-but-always-works trick for helping those cookies not to spread: sprinkle in the remaining 2 tbsp of flour into the cookie dough and quickly mix together - just a couple of rotations around the bowl!

You're getting closer to delicious chocolate chip cookies, friend! Wahoo! Now, start to roll out your cookie dough - the dough balls should be about 2 inches in diameter. Once you've rolled out 12 and placed them on your baking pan (BEST baking pans EVER), bake on the center rack in the 375 degree preheated oven for 9 minutes.

While those cookies are baking, roll out the other half of the dough and place on a second baking sheet. If your kitchen gets really hot when your oven is on like mine does, stick the baking sheet with the cookie dough balls on it in the fridge for a few minutes until the cookies in the oven finish up.

Remove the baked cookies from the oven, and allow them to sit on the baking pan for 5-10 minutes before placing them on a cooling rack. Place the second pan of cookie dough balls in the oven & bake.

Enjoy those cookies with your friends & fam! Bring some joy to your neighbors! Cheer up a friend! (Basically, have fun with these and make other people happy with 'em. :D)