Between my two kids, my husband, and myself, someone in our house has been sick since early September. First my son had Bronchitis, then he got a nasty stomach virus, two days later my 3 year old got the stomach virus, then two days later my husband got the stomach virus. Next, my 3 year old had Pneumonia, now my 10 year old has Pneumonia, and I have pharyngitis.. what the heck is that anyway? I don’t know.
The first thing I did after I realized that just cleaning the house wasn’t getting rid of the germs(like anything actually will) was to buy two cans of Lysol, one for soft porous surfaces and one for hard surfaces. Then I sprayed and cleaned all of the door handles, cabinets, remote controls, chairs, stair rails, the iron, anything that we touch I Lysoled.

Then I had a brilliant idea! I remembered that my new Frigidaire Affinity Washing Machine has a Sanitize setting so I grabbed all of the sheets, blankets, pillow cases, stuffed animals, towels, pajamas, and anything else that the kids wore or touched regularly and SANITIZED them!

If only I could toss my area rugs, sofas, carpet, and toys in the washing machine, that would be awesome! Oh, but I learned recently that you can put some toys in the dishwasher. That would be considered sanitizing right?

Here’s another post about my Frigidaire washing machine.

What special cleaning rituals do you have when you or your child is sick? Do you hire someone to clean for you? Bust out the vinegar? Or let the dust pile up because you’re to tired to clean? Let me know here.

I wish I could sanitize our entire house in my Frigidaire Affinity washing machine.. is a post from: The Mommy Insider. It looks like you are reading this post in your favorite RSS reader. Don't be shy..hop on over to check out our current giveaways, coupon codes, and to share your comments!

Don’t you hate it when you put your glass under an ice dispenser, push the dispenser button and next thing you know, there are 20 ice cubes in your glass and on the floor? That’s what happens when I use my mom’s ice dispenser. Like anything, I got used to it over time.

Now that I have a beautiful Frigidaire Gallery Refrigerator with an ice dispenser at my house I can actually limit the number of ice cubes that come out! If I want one ice cube, I tap my glass against the dispenser and one ice cube comes out! It’s awesome. I know this sounds trivial but I hate it when ice cubes come pouring out of the dispenser and fill up the glass so fast that they can’t all fit and then they end up on the floor.

Here is a quick video demonstration of the ‘one ice cube phenomenon’. I sound very Zen like.. like I’m instructing a yoga class or something so don’t fall asleep. The video is about 16 seconds long. Enjoy.

Hilarious huh?

This post is part of my series of Frigidaire appliances review posts. You can read all of my Frigidaire appliance review posts here.

More Frigidaire links to check out and how you can win Frigidaire appliances:
• Frigidaire More Me-Time Guarantee
• The Frigidaire DAILYDARE
• Tell Frigidaire what 5 things you would do with an extra hour and you’re automatically entered for a chance to win a suite of NEW Frigidaire appliances!
• Frigidaire on Facebook

Just one ice cube please! is a post from: The Mommy Insider. It looks like you are reading this post in your favorite RSS reader. Don't be shy..hop on over to check out our current giveaways, coupon codes, and to share your comments!

As I’ve gotten to know my new Frigidare appliances better, I’ve become very dependent on features of the appliances that I didn’t have in my old appliances and I now rely on and appreciate the following features of each appliance all of which I use almost every day.

The Frigidaire Gallery Refrigerator
I love that the refrigerator’s ice and water dispenser has a lock feature which makes it so that Sebastian and Madelyn aren’t able to get water or ice when I don’t want them to.
USAGE EXAMPLE: I don’t want Madelyn using the ice or water dispenser is after 6pm because I don’t want her to have to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. If she gets up, I get up. Another thing I like about the Frigidaire refrigerator is that it makes smaller ice cubes than my mom’s does. We use thin tall glasses as opposed to wide short glasses and the smaller that ice cubes that the Frigidaire Gallery Refrigerator makes fit my glasses just right.
The drawers in the refrigerator are tall so I am able fit heads of lettuce and other large items including a whole watermelon (the kids favorite!) in the drawers without stuffing without the drawer being difficult to close.

The Frigidaire Gallery Electric Range
Almost every day I use the quick boil feature on the Frigidare Gallery Range.
USAGE EXAMPLE: I drink tea and used to have to wait for what seemed like forever for the water to boil and would sometimes put my teacup in my old microwave to boil the water, but actually broke two tea cups doing that, so the quick boil feature is something I really appreciate. I also appreciate the high rim around the edge of the range which keeps food and spills from being wiped onto the floor. My son and husband thought it was really convenient to wipe the crumbs off of the range onto the floor or in-between the range and cabinet thinking I wouldn’t figure it out. Talk about being embarrassed.. imagine all of the crumbs and dried up spills on the floor that the appliance installers saw when they removed the old range.

The Frigidaire Gallery Dishwasher
The dishwasher racks are sturdier than my old dishwasher’s racks and the adjustable racks and silverware compartments are great for small stuff.
USAGE EXAMPLE: I was often frustrated when the top rack would tilt downward almost as if it was going to cause the dishwasher to fall out from the cabinet. The dishwasher’s drawers have lots of folding/storage options which are great for small lids and those little plastic things that go inside sippy cup tops. I wash Madelyn’s bath toys in the dishwasher so the small storage areas are wonderful for those as well. The sanitizing option is great for moms who’s baby uses bottles and for those bath toys that have built up soap scum on them.

The Frigidaire Affinity Front Load Washer and Dryer
The washer and dryer are fabulous! My favorite features are the seven wash cycles including one especially for whites and deep clean sanitize and the door lock feature.
USAGE EXAMPLE: Not that Sebastian (my 10 year old son) or Tim (my husband) do laundry very often but it annoyed the daylights out of me when they would add clothes 10 minutes after a load was started. Now, they think twice before adding garments because they have to hit the pause button first so the door will unlock. Otherwise, the door can’t be opened during a cycle. Adding detergent is simple with the small dispenser drawer that holds the laundry products you use including detergent, fabric softener, and bleach.
It’s really easy to remove the link trap from the dryer and unlike my old dryer (over 10 yrs. old) the lint doesn’t get stuck or snag on anything when I pull it out.

The Frigidaire Gallery About the Range Microwave
I’m not so fond of how loud the beep is but I do appreciate the repeating beeps when I forget about the cooked food.
USAGE EXAMPLE: There are times when I go upstairs to do something while chicken nuggets are cooking, and there used to be times when I would forget about them and not remember them until I found them in the microwave 1/2 an hour later. You know how kids are, if they are busy, they’re not hungry. Madelyn could care less about food most of the time so if I was cooking for her only, I would sometimes forget about the food in the microwave because the beep wasn’t very loud or would not repeat if I didn’t get the food out, on my old microwave. I have not forgotten about food in the microwave since getting the Frigidaire Gallery Microwaver because it continues to beep (very loudly) until I open the microwave.

My love.. in photographs

I know you will enjoy your new Frigidaire appliances and they WILL save you time as you will learn more about with their More-Me-Time Guarantee explained on the Frigidaire More Me-Time Guarantee site here.

P.S. Follow me on Twitter to be kept up to date on me and my new Frigidaire appliances!

More Frigidaire links to check out:
• Frigidaire More Me-Time Guarantee
• The Frigidaire DAILYDARE
• Tell Frigidaire what 5 things you would do with an extra hour and you’re automatically entered for a chance to win a suite of NEW Frigidaire appliances!
• Frigidaire on Facebook

Why I appreciate each of my 5 new Frigidaire appliances is a post from: The Mommy Insider. It looks like you are reading this post in your favorite RSS reader. Don't be shy..hop on over to check out our current giveaways, coupon codes, and to share your comments!

So I’ve been using my new Frigidaire appliances for about a month now and am LOVING all of them. Each of them has saved me time in one way or another and I am excited to tell you that my Frigidaire range has saved me more time than I imagined.. partly because of my 9 year old! The Frigidaire Range has passed the More Me-Time Gauranteed test.

Sebastian absolutely loves using our new Frigidaire range.

• Did he cook before we got our new range? Uh, no.
• Did he prepare food before we got our new range? Uh, no.
• What gives?  Let’s see.. maybe it’s the Quick Boil feature?  The shiny stovetop surface? The 5 racks in the oven? The huge capacity? The 5 stovetop burners? I don’t know!?

So far, Sebastian has made pancakes (2 days in a row!), the kids all time favorite.. macaroni and cheese, and roasted potatoes.  Yes, Sebastian has used all of these features of our new Frigidaire Range.. as have I.  He doesn’t do all of the cooking after all.

As I’m sure you are aware, timing dinner can be difficult. That’s when the Keep Warm setting comes in really handy.  OK, so maybe it’s not dinner timing so much as it is MY TIMING.  I can be pretty unorganized (I blame it on ADD) when it comes to preparing meals and will have one part of a meal done before another, so the Keep Warm setting is one of my favorites.  I can keep the food that I ‘accidentally’ finished first, warm while preparing and cooking the rest of the food.  My husband especially appreciates the Keep Warm setting as he won’t eat food that isn’t HOT!

A couple of other features Frigidaire Range features that moms will appreciate are:

· Fits-More™ Oven: A unique rack configuration creates more cooking space, so I can do more.
· Largest Range Capacity with Second Oven: Cook a large meal effortlessly with the double oven range. Offering the largest cooking capacity available so you can cook two meals, at different temperatures, at once.

I can even put magnets on my new Frigidaire ‘REAL Stainless Steel’ Range! I’m not sure when you’d want to do that, but I think that’s pretty cool.

Check out the entire line of NEW Frigidaire Gallery Appliances on the Frigidaire website here.

P.S. Follow me on Twitter to be kept up to date on me and my new Frigidaire appliances!  Exciting, huh?

More Frigidaire links to check out and how you can win Frigidaire appliances:

• Frigidaire More Me-Time Guarantee
• The Frigidaire DAILYDARE
• Tell Frigidaire what 5 things you would do with an extra hour and you’re automatically entered for a chance to win a suite of NEW Frigidaire appliances!
• Frigidaire on Facebook

My new Frigidaire range.. yes it really helps save me time, especially when my 9 year old does the cooking! is a post from: The Mommy Insider. It looks like you are reading this post in your favorite RSS reader. Don't be shy..hop on over to check out our current giveaways, coupon codes, and to share your comments!

I’ve had a great time with my new Frigidaire appliances. I buy more food, cook more (we don’t live off hummus and carrots anymore!), and have washed more laundry than ever.  I can’t wait for my new dishwasher!   I am much more motivated to do laundry on a regular basis, and to cook since I have a new refrigerator, range, microwave, and washer and dryer.  I’m so much more motivated to do laundry now that I know I’m going to see a brand new shiny red Affinity washer and dryer than I was when I was using a 20+ year old washing machine and several year old dryer.

One of my favorite things about the refrigerator is that we can serve ourselves filtered water with ice, anytime. I know.. a lot of you have had high-tech refrigerators that dispense ice and water from the door for a long time, but I was behind the times when it came to my refrigerator.  We definitely drink more water now that it’s filtered and so easy to get.  I’m not one to buy bottled water so I didn’t drink much water but now I fill my cup up a few times a day, probably still not enough, but I drink more water than I did before getting my new Frigidaire Gallery Refrigerator.

I had a regular stainless steel refrigerator before the new Frigidaire Gallery Refrigerator and the fingerprint situation was such that the fridge could have been sold as an art piece.  This refrigerator however, doesn’t allow for the smudgy fingerprints as much as the old one so which is great and I can even put magnets on the front of the refrigerator as you can see in the photograph to the left.

Some features of my Frigidaire Gallery Refrigerator are:

• SpaceWise™ Organization System
• Quick Ice
• Quick Freeze
• SpillSafe™ Shelves
• Real Stainless Steel
• Ice & Water Filtration
• Magnets can be put the front of the refrigerator doors

More Frigidaire links to check out and how you can win Frigidaire appliances:

• Frigidaire More Me-Time Guarantee
• The Frigidaire DAILYDARE
• Tell Frigidaire what 5 things you would do with an extra hour and you’re automatically entered for a chance to win a suite of NEW Frigidaire appliances!
• Frigidaire on Facebook

My Frigidaire Gallery Refrigerator serves some great filtered water! is a post from: The Mommy Insider. It looks like you are reading this post in your favorite RSS reader. Don't be shy..hop on over to check out our current giveaways, coupon codes, and to share your comments!

Tim walked in the room at about 8:05 this morning calling my name over and over.. Alicia, Alicia, Alicia!  I didn’t want to wake up.  The first morning I’ve slept in until 8:00 and he’s trying to wake me up?  About 30 seconds later I heard “Willie” call out “Your new appliances are here!”. just like they do on the Home Make-Over show.  That got me out of bed in record time.  It was so cool!

Willie our fabulous appliance installer, along with his 2 fast and efficient assistants and Tim straight from Electrolux are installing our new Frigidaire Washer and Dryer quicker than I ever could have imagined.

It’s 8:45am and we’re having a party in my garage!  My adrenaline is pumping and I can’t wait to report back to you when everything is installed and working!

Things are changing by the minute.. the Microwave just made its way inside so I’ll be back with more news as I have it!

–update– Willie just started the washing machine for me to make sure it works and it’s amazing!  The spin cycle is so quiet!

You can read more and see more photographs of my Frigidaire appliances and experiences on my new Gadget blog, GadgetGoddess.com.

They’re here! My new Frigidaire appliances are being installed as I write this! is a post from: The Mommy Insider. It looks like you are reading this post in your favorite RSS reader. Don't be shy..hop on over to check out our current giveaways, coupon codes, and to share your comments!