sombrueil_mongrel, that is another explanation but the KitchenAid Dishwasher has a reflection to it and is more chrome-like so is brighter with less grain. The LG Dishwasher has more nickel in it which can be seen by the more grayish color and the fact that it is not magnetic. It has a grain to it. I was thinking the KitchenAid was richer but now I see that the LG's stainless is most likely sturdier and definitely easier to clean. I now feel disappointed since the Bosch dishwasher with the cutlery tray I loved and it matched better but I chose the KitchenAid for the drying feature and the little bag in the front to hold plastic lids. If I known that the Bosch had a better stainless steel, then I would have had one more factor to consider. But in all fairness, so far I have been happy with my KitchenAid Dishwasher as well as my LG Refrigerator. I do wish they matched better and I know the Bosch was a better match with the handle but I had no idea it was a better match with the SS also since the store did not have the dishwashers near each other and their lighting is different. I am going to have to test the GE Cafe Range I am going to buy but I have a feeling it will not be magnetic since to my eyes it matches my LG refrigerator better now that I know that a more gray look could be more nickel content. But I would love to believe that they are both the better Stainless Steel with the grain different and one having a little more Chromium and a little less nickel. But I don't see any nickel in the finish of the KA DW. Does anyone know what type of SS each of these appliances is made out of? Our world is so amazing that we can never know everything and everyday is a new learning opportunity.

Oh yeah! Gotta hear about those BJ sitings in the East; don't know if we are quite prepared yet. LOL Started the new WW last evening. The Core Plan is a huge list of foods that you can eat without counting....sounds good, but ya gotta know when you are "satisfied". HAAA!! not likely....I'm eating lots of those Core foods, but tracking the points. So far, I'm not hungry, which leads me to believe that I was straying from the plan a bit with my choices and could account for my major stall; then the 3-pound gain. I'm not worried, as I know the weight will coming off again...I am NEVER GIVING UP!!! In addition to my scheduled classes in the fitness center here, I've been taking a 20-25 minute walk with a colleague about 3-4 times a week during lunch. We get lots of stress out, solve some work-related problems, and I feel great about the 1-2 points I earn! Should boost my losing ways a bit, I hope. Marci, I miss you when you don't post often, but I understand. When my stepdaughters or nieces are around, my opportunity to get near my office is "zero". Whenever I see a daycare (especially in the morning when parents are dropping off), I think of you! Can't wait to get to meet everyone next year. Raeanne, I hope DH was properly dressed when he finally saw the balloon! I'll never forget my MIL's classic line about skylights in a great room or bathroom....."you have absolutely no privacy!" DH and I always howl when we talk about that! She should only know about your experience this morning. LOL Tikanas, I read about the South Beach diet this morning. Because so many people have had such success with it, I thought I might try to tie it in with Weight Watchers. Not sure I can do that easily, so I'll stick with my plan until I hit another stall. Then maybe I'll shake it up a bit again! Amy, please check in with us. Suzanne, you sound so peaceful this morning... Maddie, put down the tissues and come and say "hello". Do you need me to send out some chicken soup? Patti & Dave, hope you both are spared the latest bad weather down there. Jen, Joanne, Gretchen, Besh, KY Susie.....where are you? Take care, eat healthy, and NEVER NEVER GIVE UP! DeeMarie

Love hearing stories like this. My 28 year old nephew was born 3 months early and weighed in at a whopping 1 lb. 12 oz. My brother's wedding ring fit all the way up the baby's leg. My nephew was/is very fortunate that he had/has no health or learning issues related to his prematurity. He recently became a father but the little knit cap of his that his mom saved all these years didn't begin to fit on his own full term baby's head. Best wishes to your daughter for the next 21 years and more.

Let me be the contrarian here. If you need to cut back somewhere, the fridge is an obvious place to start. It's easily replaceable at a later date, and, as others on GW have observed, the fridge is the appliance that gives you the least bang for your buck. I see no conflict in buying an expensive range and keeping an old fridge. Our kitchen renovation ran well into six figures (not including appliances) and we spent another $14K on a Wolf rangetop, M Series oven and CSO, but decided to keep our 3 y.o. KitchenAid dishwasher, and 25 y.o. Hotpoint fridge. Both my wife and I think the kitchen looks quite nice this way. I'd be happy to post a picture if someone could tell me how to do it (I click photo and click on the picture, but nothing seems to happen). In any event, our new kitchen layout precluded re-using our old Thermador range (even though it was in perfect shape), so cooking appliances were the obvious area to devote to our rapidly-dwindling resources. My wife didn't think it was worth the extra $1,000 to get a CSO instead of a double oven, but I ultimately convinced her it was worth a shot. She still prefers the M Series, so the CSO is "my" oven and the M Series is "hers". The dishwasher decision came next. I would love to get a Miele Pro Series DW at some point, as it can do a load in 25 minutes, but at $5K it's pretty pricey. Our KitchenAid runs fine, so we decided to re-use it, but have a 220V receptacle installed under the sink. So, a future upgrade to a Miele will be pretty simple. Finally decisions had to be made about a refrigerator. Our fridge space goes into a cubby in the mud room, so we're lucky in that we can accommodate either a counter depth or a full-depth fridge. Neither my wife nor I could see the point in spending $8K on a SZ or other high-end fridge, when $2K will provide you with a fridge that works almost as well and has more storage space, so we ruled out a counter-depth pretty quickly. There were 2 main reasons why we decided to keep our old fridge, at least for the time being. The first is my concern about noise and reliability. Our 25 y.o. Hotpoint is very quiet and has had exactly one service call in 25 years (by contrast our 3 new Wolf appliances have had a total of 7 service calls in just 4 months). My perception is that newer appliances just aren't built as well as they used to be. We have to keep our GE washer & dryer under maintenance contracts, as they seem to crap out at least once a year, whereas our old Whirlpool ran over 20 years without a problem. Also after reading reviews of even highly-rated refrigerators, I get the impression that new fridges are much noisier than the old ones. Someone told me that this is because the new energy-efficient compressors make a lot of noise. On second thought, maybe I shouldn't be too concerned about this, as the fan on our Wolf M Series sounds like a jet engine once the oven gets hot. Most of our meals are spent with that thing howling in the background. Maybe the biggest reason for keeping the old fridge though, was due to a simple matter of aesthetics. My wife doesn't like having too much stainless steel in the kitchen, and all of the better full depth fridges only seem top come in that. Our old fridge is a nice cream color with black accents on the handles that perfectly matches our Kohler Biscuit sinks. The closest you can get to this color nowadays seems to be a "bisque" color, that is monotone and way too yellow for my taste. So we decided to keep our old fridge in the hope that something more to our liking comes out before this one decides to kick the bucket. We took a 3 week vacation during construction and left the fridge powered off and closed, which was a big mistake. We almost decided to chuck the fridge when we came back and discovered it was full of mold. It took almost a full day of scrubbing with Clorox, but it ended up looking almost new again. The same thing happened again, when the carpenters took the fridge out for the floor refinishing. They took the doors off this time and covered the fridge in plastic. We returned to find the worst of both worlds - the fridge was full of both sawdust and mold. In the end, both my wife and I are happy with our decision to keep the old fridge. We know its days are numbered, but will be sad to see it go.