Thursday Tidbits: Mascara, Babies, Jewelry!

First things first, let's talk mascara.
I am a mascara lover, and when I find a new great tube of mascara, I get giddy.

For the past few years, I've sworn by L'Oreal Volume Shocking mascara.  It is truly amazing.  Sadly, they discontinued it (whyyyyyyyyyyyy???) and I've been resorting to buying tubes from eBay.  Not kidding!  New in package, of course.  But still.  I knew that the day would come that I would see the complete disappearance of this, and I've been looking for a suitable substitute.

Enter L'Oreal Extra-Volume Collagen.  With claims to Grab Each And Every Lash and deliver 12x More Impact Instantly, how could I not give it a go?

I'm loving it so far, and I think this love will continue to grow since I think mascara in its first few days of use is too runny and weak.  I like it after some air has gotten into the tube and it gets thicker.  See, I'm nuts over it!

Last year I splurged on Diorshow mascara and it was too weak for me.  Then I used Maybelline's The Falsies for a while, but fell out of love with it when it became too flaky towards the end of the day.  Let's hope L'Oreal keeps this one around for a while!

Next order of business - you may have seen on Twitter last night (come follow! @alizadventures) that I cooked Crockpot applesauce for us last night.  We had it with Italian chicken sausage and sauerkraut.  I had a few requests for the recipe, and I posted it last year in this post.  The 4 apples I used cooked down to serve just us two, so if you want leftovers, try doubling the recipe.  Also -- just a note: although the recipe doesn't contain a lot of sugar, I tried once subbing it with the baking form of Splenda and it didn't turn out right.  The sugar must help break down the apples or ... something.  I was no science major but I do know what tastes right.  :)

I'm also happy to be shipping off two necklaces today for a bride who wanted to deck her two bridesmaids out in jewelry that was fun, unique, and different from the "traditional" bridesmaids jewelry.  The girls will be wearing navy chiffon J. Crew dresses with sweetheart necklines, and I made these necklaces with a layered look and a leaf pendant to match her overall fall/leafy theme.  What do you think?  They slightly differ from each other, so the bride is going to match the necklace to each girl's personality.

And finally, one of my fellow Recessionistas had her baby on Monday (you met Allison and saw her baby bump in this post) and I've been introduced to the most amazing site, Take Them a Meal.  You can sign up to bring people meals through this site.  The best part is, you can see when other people are bringing food and even what they are bringing ... so mama and daddy don't end up with 6 lasagnas on a Tuesday night!  Ingenious, right?! 

So here's what I'm wondering -- all of you moms out there, what did you like for people to bring?  Anyone have ideas for a dish I could prepare for them that is tasty, pretty simple to put together, and easy to transport?  Most importantly, easy for the new parents to heat up (if needed) and enjoy?