Forget the fancy restaurants and fame - one of the best parts of being on Gossip Girl for Blake Lively is having nice handbags, she says.

“I probably have, like, 60 gorgeous bags,” the 21-year-old tells W in the December issue. “I have a closet with my really sharp, fancy, nice ones - the ones that go with my Valentino pumps, for example. And then I have a closet with the ones that are a little more rugged-feeling, the kind that go with my Belstaff motorcycle boots.”

“I’ve never really had a competitive relationship in any work situation,” she says. “The media is always trying to pit us against each other, I guess because it’s just not interesting to say, ‘Everyone gets along; everybody just works 18-hour days and goes home to sleep.’ That’s not fun to read, I guess.”

Source:www.People.com

She may play a reformed wild girl on Gossip Girl - but Blake Lively says her romantic life isn’t nearly as scandalous as her onscreen persona, Serena van der Woodsen.

“There wasn’t a period in my life like Serena went through, where I was doing drugs and having sex with my best friend’s boyfriend,” Lively, 20, tells Cosmopolitan in its September issue. “I never went through that kind of crazy.”

In fact, the actress is steadily dating costar Penn Badgley.

“I’ve kissed just three people in my life, other than stuff that I’ve done for TV or movies,” she says. “I know - I’m weird!

“I hope Brad Pitt doesn’t hear this,” Lively says, teasing. “He’s never going to want to marry me!”

“I was class president, on the cheerleading squad, in a competitive show choir, and in, like, six different clubs,” she says.

“I don’t drink. I don’t do drugs,” she says, deadpanning, “But I do sleep around a lot.”

• Blake Lively, picking up the $78 bill for her

romantic dinner with Penn Badgley, at New York’s ONE

Little West 12th. “They were cute, sitting next to each other, arm-in-arm,

the entire time, instead of across the table from one another,” an

eyewitness tells us. The Gossip Girl stars supped on steak and

salad.

• Reese Witherspoon, walking hand-in-hand with Jake Gyllenhaal through Paris’ Jardin du Luxembourg. The happy couple have been in London, where Gyllenhaal has been training for his latest movie role - on horseback!

• Carmen Electra, sticking close to fiancé Rob Patterson at Prive in Las Vegas. The actress hosted an evening at the club - and arrived on her beau’s arm. Patterson never left Electra’s side, even when she danced a bit on the couches.

• Nicky Hilton, dining with beau David Katzenberg - and his father - at Giorgio Baldi in Santa Monica.

• Brittany Murphy, sharing an early dinner with husband

Simon Monjack on the patio of West Hollywood’s Chateau Marmont.

Monjack, in all black, smoked a cigar and listened while Murphy chatted over

dinner.

• Howard Stern, checking out a screening of Hellboy II: The Golden Army at a United Artists theater in East Hampton, N.Y., with

fiancée Beth Ostrosky and designer Calvin Klein.

• By DAVID CAPLAN, ALEXIS CHIU, MARK GRAY, MONICA RIZZO and JEFFREY SLONIM

Celebrity Hot Spots.

Friday’s Caught in the Act >

Blake Lively’s character may have trouble fitting into New York society in Gossip Girl, but she’s the toast of Hollywood in the August issue of Vanity Fair.

Along with Kristen Stewart, Emma Roberts and Amanda Seyfried, Lively’s crowned one of the most promising young stars in the era of YouTube and Gawker, where celebrity comes faster - and harder - than ever before.

“Boundaries dissolve everywhere they turn their pretty heads,” observes the magazine.

Others included in the pantheon of next-generation A-listers include the Jonas Brothers; Jonah Hill, Emma Stone and Christopher Mintz-Plasse of Superbad; Judd Apatow regularJay Baruchel; The 40-Year-Old Virgin’s Kat Dennings; Juno’s Olivia Thirlby; Transformers‘ Rachael Taylor; Weeds‘ Hunter Parrish; Z%26#246;e Kravitz; Rob Brown; Michael Angarano; Josh Peck; Summer Bishil; and Amber Heard. Also on the list: seemingly the entire cast of Gossip Girl, including Jessica Szohr, Chace Crawford, Ed Westwick, Leighton Meester, Taylor Momsen and Penn Badgley.
- Michael Y. Park

The off-screen romance of Gossip Girl stars Blake Lively and Penn Badgley has met with parental approval of a sort: actress Kelly Rutherford, who plays Lively’s mom on the show, gives the couple a thumbs up.

“I think they’re so lovely,” Rutherford told PEOPLE on Thursday at the debut of designer Rogan Gregory’s fashion line for Target at Barney’s department store in Beverly Hills.

PHOTOS: See PEOPLE’s exclusive pics of Blake %26 Penn’s romantic getaway!

Rutherford says the couple has benefited by being able experience the phenomenon of Gossip Girl’s skyrocketing popularity together as their chemistry gelled.

“To be able to go through this ride and success and to have somebody to do that with and share that experience, I think they’re both very fortunate,” she says.

The actress also says the cast and crew had no trepidation about the coupling, or fears of on-set fallout if things don’t work out between them.

“No, because I think they’ve known each other for a long time,” she says. “They’re both so together and whatever happens is their business, and I think they’re both darling and very together as people.”

Still, Rutherford jokingly admitted she’s not always on the inside track of the relationship: “Of course the ‘mother’ is always the last to know.”

Before Penn Badgley and Blake Lively were outed as a couple (see PEOPLE’s exclusive pics here), Matthew Settle, who plays Penn Badgley’s TV dad on Gossip Girl helped to keep gossip about the relationship between the young lovers a secret.

But now that the cat is out of the bag, he says, “I think it’s nice.”

Settle offered fatherly insight about Badgley and Lively on his way into the Entertainment Weekly upfront party at The Bowery Hotel in New York on May 13. (The new couple also attended.)

About keeping the relationship a secret before it was revealed, Penn’s

TV Dad said, “you can prod and pry, but you don’t want to be too intrusive.

I made my own assumptions,” he said. “But I didn’t want to talk about it,

to get involved.”

Now that the news is out, Settle believes America will react positively.

“I think people are going to love them as a couple,” he said. “They’re a

very hot couple. They look good together. And I think they’re good for each other, so why not?”

Settle’s date at the event was his wife, Israeli born actress Naama

Nativ, also an actress, who said that she plays “one of Adam %26#91;Sandler’s%26#93; Israeli girlfriends in his new film, You Don’t Mess with The Zohan.”

But Settle and Nativ have a solid bond. Married for two years, Settle said that he met Nativ, “in Los Angeles through friends.”

• Blake Lively, scooping up spring looks during a

shopping trip in downtown New York. The Gossip Girl star stopped

into Armani Exchange during her expedition.

• Eva Longoria Parker and Tony Parker, lunching together at Serafina in midtown Manhattan. The

upbeat pair ordered farfalle pasta with creamy lemon sauce during their

pre-basketball game meal. The couple skipped the wine, though, because

Parker had to hit the court.

• Shanna Moakler and Travis Barker just can’t seem

to stay away from each other. The recently divorced couple spent the day

together at Disneyland, a source tells PEOPLE. “They went to Disneyland as

‘friends,’” says the source, adding that the off-again couple took their

children - Landon, 4, and Alabama, 2 - to the theme park. (Moakler

also has a daughter, Atiana, 8, with boxer Oscar de la Hoya.) A rep for

Moakler had no comment. Barker’s rep could not be reached for comment.

• Leonardo DiCaprio, popping into a private

tasting for SKYY Vodka’s secret new line at the Bryant Park Hotel’s Cellar

Bar in New York.

• Lindsay Lohan, sitting with friends, but acting

timid, at Hyde in West Hollywood. The actress hung out with her pals and

quietly took in the scene at the club before heading out. Also holding court

at the club: Jack Osbourne, chatting with his pals.

• By K.C. BAKER, MARK DAGOSTINO and JENNIFER GARCIA

Tuesday’s Caught in the Act >

They may be hot-and-heavy on their hit show, but Blake Lively swears there’s no off-screen romance with her Gossip Girl castmate Penn Badgley.

Now that the show’s a hit, “Everybody always tries to dig into your personal life or create things that aren’t there. . . . It’s silly,” Lively told PEOPLE at the Chanel Fine Jewelry event on Wednesday night. “Any male friend is obviously a ‘romance alert’ %26#91;for the media%26#93;, but I’ve always been friends with boys my whole life. ”

(Penn also attended the event, arriving just after Lively.)

So how does she deal with the tabloid reports?

The same goes for the rumor that the blonde beauty had plastic surgery shortly before Gossip Girl began.

“People just wanna talk,” she sighed. “They wanna create negative things about you and your life and make up things. You can’t let them affect you!”