David, Amanda and Hayden Harding

Hayden's announcement!!!

2011-09-25T15:27:00.000-07:00

My mommy is going to have another baby!!! I'm SO excited! Mom thinks that I will handle it better if it is a girl because I run around the day care giving all the girls kisses. When mom hold a boy I cry and get really jealous! I can't wait to have my little brother or sister to play with! Mom and Dad will know on Tuesday what we will be having. Our baby is due February 24... Love all of you! Come back soon to see what the gender is :)

I just love this picture! Early morning not ready to smile...

Birthday Boy!

2011-02-05T16:42:00.001-08:00

I can not believe that a year has gone by! Hayden has grownup so much! He is SO smart and very active and into everything! Today we had a party for him and yesterday he got his first hair cut. They cut off about 3 inches from the top. He looks so much more grown up to me. We are SO grateful everyday for him. He is such an amazing little boy who brings SO much joy into our lives. Not a day goes by that he doesn't make us laugh. Here are some pictures of our little man.
I took these about a week ago... I was trying to make it all stick up so I wouldn't forget how long it was. He was not really in the mood for pictures...

Right Before his hair cut...

Handsome little man!

Hayden's smash cake that I made for him.

Halloween 2010

2010-10-29T17:33:00.000-07:00

Hayden has been so much fun! He is a dinosaur for Halloween and he has loved his costume from the first time we put it on him. Today we had our Halloween party at school and then a Trunk or Treating at church. It has been a blast! Can I just say how much we love being parents. I LOVE holidays with Hayden. Makes them so much fun! I can't imagine how it will be when he realizes how much fun he is having. Here are some pictures of our cute little Dino.

Utah Trip

2010-08-01T11:10:00.000-07:00

I wrote this a couple days after coming back it has just been waiting for the slides...

We just got back from an amazing vacation in Utah where we blessed Hayden and hung out with the family. We spent a week with Grandma and Grandpa Lovell and the next at Grandma and Grandpa Harding's house. It was so fun having everyone meet Hayden. He was the perfect baby he slept on both flights, the entire time on the way to Vegas and almost the whole flight on the way back to Boston, he just woke up for landing. He had so much fun hanging out with everyone and can't wait to come visit again soon.
Hayden's blessing was very nice. He looked like such a stud! It was so nice that we were able to share this moment with all of our family. We did a double blessing with Brad and Mary Beth's son Ansley who is 3 days younger than Hayden. We did the blessing in Provo at David's grandparents home. Thank you Wayne for taking pictures for us both at the blessing and in St. George.
Mom thank you so much for letting me quilt! I had a blast and we LOVE the baby blanket! Hayden still plays with the bright colors of it and it washed up great. When I got married I got fabric to make a quilt. I cut all the pieces to it and started putting it together. I sent it off to my mom and she finished it for me. Well the same happened with the quilting of it. I started and she finished. It is such a beautiful quilt and I love it. It turned out great. Now I need to bind it I promise not to send it back for you to do mom. :)
Hayden learned some new and relearned some old tricks while out in Utah. We have to thank Ansley for reteaching Hayden how much fun blowing spit bubbles is. He did it for only a couple days and then stopped but after watching Ansley it is his favorite thing to do. Hayden also learned how to sit up without any support and hates laying down now. He thinks he is such a big boy! He is a super active child now and LOVES jumping up and down! I would bet he will be crawling within the next month. He is to curious to just sit and look at something he wants to go and get it.
Hayden went swimming for the first time with Grandma Lovell, Daxton, and I. He was kicking his little legs like crazy and will be a great swimmer as long as the pool is heated. We went again when we were in St. George and the poor boy was freezing! He also went camping for the first time and loved it! Thank you so much Hans and Shellie for the great time up in the canyon also! It was fun watching the boys be boys...
While in St. George we hung out. David played games with his brothers and dad and Hayden and I chilled. We went to Aaron and Brandy's for Aaron's birthday cake on Sunday and dinner another night. Thank you so much it was delicious! I was able to escape and go out to lunch with Sharisa on Monday and Hayden and I went out with Mandi on Friday. It was nice not having any plans while in Utah. My plans were to make no plans and just enjoy our time and that is exactly what we did. I would have to say it was the best vacation we have ever had!
I want to thank everyone for the awesome vacation! I know it isn't easy to drop everything and just hang out with us but we really appreciate you all doing that for us. It was hard for us to return back to Connecticut! We will see you all again in December though. Thanks again!

Blessing Slide Show

Hayden's First Easter

2010-04-04T17:09:00.002-07:00

Being a parent instead of the child during the holidays is by far much more fun... Even though Hayden is only 8 weeks old we had SO much fun with him this Easter. We took him on base where they had 15,000 plastic eggs scattered around for the children to find. David and I both helped him find his eggs and put them into his basket. We also had an egg hunt outside with the neighborhood children and our own egg hunt inside. Hayden helped paint 2 eggs and the third was painted and given to us by his bud Calin for his first Easter. (Thanks Laura!) It was so much fun playing with Hayden and helping him find all of his eggs. I can't wait until next year when he will be doing it by himself. We ended our day with Carolyn and Terry who gave us an awesome Easter dinner. We are so blessed and very thankful this Easter season for our Savior and for the sacrifice that he gave for us and for his resurrection.

Connecticut Flood!

2010-03-31T10:07:00.000-07:00

After watching the news and seeing the devastation that is across Connecticut I know that we were totally watched over and blessed not only at work but at our home also. We are still on a flood watch because the major river in Ct. is continuing to rise. Norwich which is 20 minutes away got 10 inches of rain in 60 hours and the Montville 5 minutes from us were told to evacuate last night because of a dam that sits above them might break. As far as I know it hasn't.

Yesterday when I was at work we decided to close the center because the road in front of the center was being closed due to flooding. We started calling parents at 10:30 and we got the last of the children out at 2. The parents were unable to get to the center because the road was closed in 3 different places. We had 2 parents that got in but were unable to get back out. We had a parent at the top of the road coordinating with the police and we were told that we would be gotten out by a boat then by the National Guard. Then we were told that no one would be coming for us and to hold tight and that maybe after the tide receded that the water would go down. We are not close enough to the ocean that it was making that much of a difference. As of 9pm it was still closed. I believe that it is also closed today. We had parents climbing over the train tracks and one that wadded through the water, it was up to his waist. We had 4 parents that had gotten to the center and were waiting for the National Guard truck to come for a ride back up the road to CVS when we received the call that they wouldn't be coming. Five minutes later another parent came in and we asked how they got in and they responded that they walked but would be taking the 'Army Truck' back. I ran out front and asked them if they would take all of our parents with them. After they left we had 8 adults and 15 children. Carrie (one of our staff) helped another child over the train track to her mom and asked if the truck would be able to take another load. When the National Guard got to the center the rest of us jumped on the truck and went home. My boss was able to take her jeep out behind us. (I take my camera everywhere with me now that I have Hayden so I got some pics. of it) David had the car so he was waiting up at CVS for us. We took some of the other staff home and then tried to make our way home. Our normal route was flooded so we had to find an alternate route which was kinda fun because I was able to get some good pictures.
This is a parking lot for trucks not a water fall...

This is a house we drove by...

Can you believe this! This is another house we passed...

This is which way we usually go to work. I'll take a picture of it tom. on my way to work. David said the whole parking lot caved in.

The drainage system wasn't even able to hold it all.

This is the road in front of our center and the yellow is the train tracks that the parents were climbing over.

The parking lot of CVS you can see how deep the water is by looking at the shopping cart and the fire hydrant. The road is sloping up.

Terry in her jeep...

I'm 1 month old!

2010-03-15T09:46:00.000-07:00

My Likes: I love playing with my daddy, snuggling with my mommy, and getting in bed with them in the morning. I have fun grunting when I go to bed. It makes my mommy and daddy laugh and stay awake... I love listening to my mom sing songs to me. I LOVE taking baths, they are my favorite.

My Dislikes: I don't like having a dirty diaper but I hate being changed even more. I don't like when mom swaddles me with my arms down, or when she puts gloves on my hands to keep them warm.

I am a very good baby for my mommy and daddy. Mom tells everyone that I spoil her with how good I am. My mom and dad love me very much and are so grateful to have me in their lives.

This is my 1st smile caught on camera! Mom wasn't able to get the bigger smiles!

I'm 22 inches long

I'm 10 lbs! Can you believe it!

Hayden Jason Harding

2010-02-24T16:21:00.001-08:00

~~ Pregnancy -Perfect- Labor and Delivery -Perfect- Baby -Perfect- ~~
Laundry is done, house is clean and Hayden is sleeping so I will take this time to blog. Hayden was born on his due date, Friday, February 5th at 10:16pm. He was 8.5 and 19.5in. long. It was the most amazing experience ever. Everything from timing to the delivery was perfect. My mom came out on Wed. night and stayed for 2 weeks. It was so great having her out here and that she was able to get to know Hayden. Thank you SO much mom for all of your help and all the goodies that you made for us to eat and everything that you made for Hayden. I feel so blessed in my life. David has been able to stay home with me since Hayden's birth and wont be going back to work until March 13. Hayden is the best little guy ever. He hardly ever cries, only when he is getting a diaper change or is hungry. He sleeps for 4 hours at night and then wakes up only for 20-30 minutes to eat and get changed. Here are some pictures...

Hayden's room

2010-01-02T13:43:00.000-08:00

Well I said that when we were done with Hayden's room that I would post pictures of it. I still need to shorten the curtains and organize things after the shower but for the most part it is ready for him. I can't believe that his due date is 5 weeks away! It has gone SO fast! Thank you so much David for hanging the wallpaper and helping so much with his room... David said that he doesn't know if he hates wall papering or dry walling more. I forget how messy it can be when it doesn't want to stick to the wall...

Mom made this for his car seat. I can't wait to use it, I already love it! No one out here has one so I'm sure it will be a big hit! You better get ready for some orders mom.

Chelse' made this for Hayden! I LOVE IT!!! Thank you so much!

Update time...

2009-10-17T16:46:00.000-07:00

Not a lot has been going on... My pregnancy has been the best. I have only been sick once I know my next one probably wont be this easy. We have been working on our house and trying to get things organized. I feel like we are in a good spot now. We rearranged everything. I feel like I just moved into a new home. I love that feeling. David just got his orders today for shore duty... He will officially be done with the boat almost to the day that they baby is due. He will have 2 weeks off for maternity leave and then another month after that... It will be so nice having him home with us. When he is on shore duty he will be off work every day at 2 or 3 and only have duty (where he stays over night) once a month as opposed to every 4 days like now. We have been so blessed with everything and I am so thankful for how things are working out. Here are a couple pics. I'll post more of his room when it is closer done.
WE ARE HAVING A BOY!!!

22 Weeks

The beginning of our babies room. I got the crib set in today it's in the wash I'll post pictures of that when I have it on the bed...

We have also finished our basement... well half of it... The other half is just waiting for some flooring. This is my scrapbooking desk! I LOVE IT!!!

GUESS WHAT!!!

2009-07-07T17:54:00.001-07:00

I CAN PARK HERE!!! THAT'S RIGHT WE ARE EXPECTING!!!
I am due February 5th!!

Update time...

2009-07-07T17:25:00.001-07:00

So David has been home for 10 weeks now and I really should have had these pictures posted then. But here are some pictures of Homecoming. It was SO nice to see David. Me and some other wives off the boat along with Terri and Autumn (friends of ours)went to Avery point and watched for the boat to come up the river... That seemed like it took forever! We would be looking out into the ocean saying OH That must be it... just to find out that it was a sail boat or boat going away from us...Finally after about an hour the sub was finally coming home! It was SO exciting!!! I jumped in the car and went to base to wait on the pier for the sub to pull in. Luckily that wasn't as long of a wait. I couldn't believe that the boat was finally home and that I was going to see my husband after 6 months! They got the boat rigged up and let the families onto the pier and then it was a sea of men in white uniforms! Finally David came off of the boat... I couldn't believe that it was really him! It was so good to have him home! He wasn't able to come home that day because he had duty but I was able to stay with him until about 8pm. I got SO burnt being out in the sun for that long. David didn't really want to sit on the boat again after just getting off... Totally understandable... I got him Friday morning and when we came home our neighbors had decorated our door way with balloons and put flags up everywhere... It was SO nice of them! I am so grateful for everyone's help through deployment I couldn't have done it without you. Anyways here are the pictures of the damaged boat :( It will be going into dry dock for who knows how long at least a year it sounds like but that works for us because that just means David wont be going out to sea for at least 3.5 years. No complaint here... He is on this boat till Feb. and then shore duty for 3 years which means not sea time. YAY!!

David is coming HOME!!!

2009-05-20T20:26:00.000-07:00

WELCOME HOME!!! I missed you so much and I am so happy that you are home for a long time! I'm so proud of you and all of your accomplishments! I love you so much!!! Thank you for being such an amazing husband and support to me. Thank you SO much for everything that you do for me! I LOVE YOU!!!

So many pictures!!

2009-05-20T20:00:00.001-07:00

Gabe is getting SO big!!!

Brooke fell down the patio stairs a couple weeks ago. This is her second cast and has had it set twice. She goes back next monday and will hopefully be able to put on her pink cast!

David bought this in Bahrain for me... We will probably give it to our daughter... you can't see the detail in the center very well but it is amazing it is all made of silk...

Easter prior to tan...

After tan but before Shower... Sydney was cracking up!!!

After shower... I'm was a bit darker than this picture portrays...

This was painted a darker brown a year ago... Now its cream!

Can't believe it...

2009-05-19T19:02:00.000-07:00

So the day has finally come when I can start to count down the hours to Davids return. I want to thank you all for your love and prayers and support over the past 6 months. I have had alot of fun getting ready for his return. I moved back into my house, painted everything we had just painted a year ago, got my nails done, hair cut, spray tan... Yup I look tan! Who would have thought Amanda could be tan right... lol...
David and I are both excited to spend some time together it seems like since being married he has been gone. But he will return with the boat and be on it till the beginning of next year and then he will be on shore duty. That means no more sea time for 3 years YAY!!! It is going to be so crazy to have him home for that long. I'll love every minute of it. After those 3 years he will go back to a boat and serve on it for a year. At that point we could be done but that is 5 years away and who knows what will happen in that time. Today we are saying we are done but we will see... Again I thank you all for your love and support. I'll post pics when i have my camera.

Follow up & more pics

2009-03-22T13:02:00.000-07:00

To follow and see more pictures of the story of David's Boat please go to www.navy.mil

Update

2009-03-21T20:37:00.000-07:00

I was able to talk to David today for about an hour and a half. It was so good to hear from him. Thankfully he was not one that was injured during the collision... He said that the crew was very good about getting things done that needed to be done during it. We don't have a ton of information still the assessment wont be conducted till Monday so until then they will be hanging out. We have an adventure ahead of us that is the one thing that is for sure... But I know that we will get through it... Thank you all for you prayers and continued support.

USS HARTFORD

2009-03-20T15:10:00.000-07:00

I guess i should be careful what i ask for i wanted something to blog about and here it is... So first and foremost I want to say that everyone is ok... There are 15 crew members on the Hartford that have minor injuries. Today at our wives mtg. they said that the injuries were as if you had got into a fender bender and got whip lash. We don't have a lot of information other than what is on this video. I will update when I know anything. They want to pull into port and evaluate the damages before anything is declared. Please keep David and his crew in your prayers. The incident occurred around 1:00 a.m. local time Friday (5 p.m. EDT, Thursday), when the USS Hartford, a submarine, and the USS New Orleans, an amphibious ship, collided into each other in the narrow Strait of Hormuz.

This is what the sub now looks like...
copy and paste for larger picture http://navysite.de/ssn/images/ssn768coll.jpg

This is how the sub usually looks...

This is how the sub should usually looks...

HALFWAY

2009-02-28T18:50:00.000-08:00

I can't believe it... We are halfway through deployment! YEAH!!! Some days it goes by fast and other days it goes by slow... Today is fast... This year in general has gone fast. I am so grateful for that. I am keeping really busy with school, church callings and work. I am glad to be so busy it helps pass the time. Some days I wish that I wasn't so busy though it is hard to find time just to sit down... lol... David is doing good. We haven't been able to email for the past couple weeks though. I miss our emails so much!!! I can not wait until the system is fixed. He will be pulling into a couple more ports before coming home. Some of which will be France, Turkey, and the United Emirates. I hope to get more pictures from him that we can post. I am so proud of him and all that he is doing. I can not wait until he comes home. It will be fun to have him back and now that were on the down hill slide it makes it that much more exciting.

Christmas Party

2008-12-14T17:59:00.000-08:00

We had our Christmas party tonight. It was a lot of fun. I missed David a ton. I didn't have a date so I adopted one. My Godson Gabe was my date. He is so cute!!! He drools a little and sleeps a lot but still cute. Here are some pictures of the evening

Gibraltar, Spain

2008-12-07T09:47:00.000-08:00

So Deployment has began. It started about 2 weeks ago and they have already pulled into a port. David sent me some pictures so I thought that I would share them with all of you. He is Gibraltar, Spain right now. He is having a good time and he said that the time is passing quickly for him which is good. They have had a lot of fun walking around and got a tour guide to take them. It took about 3 hours to see all of it but they sent about 30 minutes at each site. He loved the monkeys! They are way friendly. He also told me that the airport run way is shared with the street and walk way for pedestrians. He watched a plane take off and enjoyed that very much. When he gets home I will post many more pictures of his adventures but for now here are the pictures and as I receive more from the various places he will visit I will post them.

Hercules pillars

St. Micheal's Cave

Monkey Trouble. They put a pretzel into his pocket and the monkey stole it back. They pick pocket a lot.

The Rock of Gibraltar

MY AMAZING HUSBAND

2008-10-24T18:26:00.000-07:00

So as many of you know David is out to sea for another week. He has been out for a little over 3 weeks. One week was spent unexpectedly in Florida. I loved it because I was able to talk to him a little bit. Well the reason that he was in Florida was a bit scary. They had a fire on the boat while in the ocean. It destroyed the fans so they had to fix them. They practice doing drills 95% of the time that they are out to sea, so putting the fire out wasn't to bad but still scary for the wife. But everyone was fine thank goodness.
David’s division and one other were in charge or fixing the problem. Everyone else on the boat were out enjoying Florida. They had a little under a week to do the job in. A guy in David's division (Dod) passed out from lack of sleep the Doc on the boat made him sleep. He had been awake a couple days in a row from the fire to working to get things fixed. David was up for a day and a half slept for a couple hours and was back to work. They have such crazy schedules I could never do them. So anyways to make a long story short they fixed the fans on Friday night at 11pm and they weren’t expected to have them done until Sunday afternoon. Because of the hard work that was put in by all those that helped awards were given out. Dod, David and 3 other men in the other division were awarded NAMS (Navy Achievement Medals). They have about 12 people in there Division the other 10 will receive honorable recognition for there help. Most people that are in the Navy only receive one NAM in a term (3-5 years I'm not sure which) and that is awarded to them when they leave the boat. This is David's second NAM that he has received since being on the boat. I am so so so proud of him. Words could never express how proud I am. He is amazing! I love him so much and appreciate all that he does. His hard work is something that I know that my children will look at and appreciate and learn from and I am so lucky to have that in my life. I am so proud of all of his accomplishments and that he does them with no expectations of receiving anything in return. As my mom says the one thing that you can count on about the Navy is you can never count on them. So even though he had the hopes of getting out of work early the next day knowing that it wouldn't happen he still pushed to get the job done.

2008-10-16T16:14:00.001-07:00

I need to do better

2008-10-16T15:14:00.000-07:00

Ok so I know that it has been FOREVER since i last wrote... My life is either not exciting enough or has so much excitement that I can't seem to find the time to blog... I'm not sure which... Well a lot has happened since the last time I blogged... Ok not that much but enough to write about. Mom and Dad came out in July. It was so much fun having them. We did a ton and David was able to get the time off to do it all with us. We did New York which was fun. Mom thought she was going to die before getting their. But David and I were amazing tour guides and kept them out of the ghetto. While there we were able to go to a Red Sox Yankee game. Since we had gone to the Red Sox the month before they were my new favorite team so I of course cheered for them... I was the hated one in the crowd... But it was so much fun yelling and getting people going. On our way down the steps out of the game a guy tried to give me a high five while saying we won. Well since I didn't win I told him that i was unable to high five him so he flipped me off... I just kinda laughed and he said ok how bout we high five to it being a good game. To that we high fived and followed the mad crowd out of the stadium. The next day we went to the Statue of Liberty. Unfortunately the tickets were sold out for the day to enter but we were able to walk around. It was a lot of fun. Mom had her first experience shopping in China Town in the hidden rooms for purses. We got some pretty good deals I think. Mom will come back just to view more of China Town. I love going their. It is my favorite place in New York. David and Dad just kinda let us do our thing their. David has it all figured out for when we do go. He holds the money and when i beg for the dang cute purse for $30 he says no and so i say sorry i would love to but he has the money so they drop it to $25 and David says $20. Then i get it... I love it!!!
We went to New Jersey the next day to meet the Meyer family who were on vacation. We had so much fun we went swimming in the Ocean. I haven't seen mom laugh so hard in awhile. We spent sometime home and then off we went on our 8 hours drive to Palmyra New York for the Hill Cummorah pageant. It was so nice to be able to go again. David and I have been a couple times and it never gets old. If anything it just gets more spiritual. I loved having mom and dad with us. I hope they enjoyed themselves as much as we enjoyed having them. So that was our vacation in a nut shell.
David was home for a little while but is out to sea now and will be out until November and then the sad day comes when he goes on Deployment. I am so not looking forward to that at all. But I have a ton of things to keep me busy. Work for one. I love working at the Day Care my bosses are the best ever. I couldn't ask for better people. They keep my busy in and of themselves. I am always doing something with them. When David is home we have dinner and a movie every Friday night at Autumns, Saturdays we are doing something with them, and Sundays we rotate Sunday Dinner between Autumn's, Terri's, and our house. It is so nice to have them here. They make it much easier when David is gone. It is still hard but I can't even imagine how it would be without them. The last thing that keeps me busy is my School. I started taking classes online through a college based out of California. They work with military spouses so it cost me 350 for 2 classes which last me 8 weeks. They also pay for all of my books. I just finished up my Humanities through the Arts class and got a B and my Psychology class that i received an A in. I wish I would have got an A in both but I didn't expect to do well in my Arts class. Thanks Shellie for all your help. I will continue doing classes for the next year and a half then transfer to 3 rivers and begin my nursing. I'm SO excited for that day to come. I can't wait.
David is doing really good on the boat. I am so proud of all his accomplishments. He is now the 3rd Senior guy in his division. So he is helping all the new guys figure things out. I love talking to people on the boat and hearing how much they like him. Autumns husband was massaging a client who happened to be his chiefs wife they started making small talk and they started talking about the navy and what boat and everything and she called her husband and he said that David was the hardest working guy in the division. I am so grateful for him and all his hard work. He will be re-enlisting while on deployment which means that we will be here for another 5 years. In that time David will be on shore duty (no more going out to sea) for 3 years of it and he will be able to finish up his school.
So that is our lives.. Not much changed but a little did. I will hopefully become better at posting as I do things with Autumn and Jim and take pictures and stuff...

Check out my Slide Show!

2008-06-29T16:33:00.001-07:00

FENWAY!!

2008-06-29T12:19:00.000-07:00

I know my brothers and parents have been waiting and waiting for this to be posted so finally a week later I am posting it.

David and I were able to go to a Red sox game last Sunday. It was so much fun!! We had the perfect seats and we only paid 85 dollars for them!!! We went with my boss and her husband Autumn and Jim. I didn't think that I would like it at all but for that price how could you say no. So we went and it was SO much fun. Jim and I were like "Oh my gosh did you see that catch or oh so close" Autumn and David couldn't have cared less but had fun none the less.

When we got their during the National Anthem these men in red shirts were rolling this big white thing out and we couldn't tell what it was but if they were doing it during the National Anthem it must have been important. It was, it was a cover for the field to protect it from the rain that began falling. They got it covered seconds before it pored rain. The game was delayed for an hour. But surprisingly you didn't get bored. The Vendors were exiting to watch and hear them yell. David had to do the whole experience Hot Dog and Peanuts. I was laughing so hard. He ate a whole bag of Peanuts by himself.

Sadly we ended up leaving early so that we could catch our train out which was an hour late coming so we could have stayed longer. It was the top of the 7th when we left and the Cardinals has scored 2 and Red sox none the game was fun to watch but nothing exciting happened till after we left. They played 13 innings and the Red sox won 5 to 3!! I was SO sad that we had to leave. But I am very very very excited to go to the Yankee Stadium with my parents when they come out to see us. It will be so much fun!!

The Fenway park is SO much smaller than it looks on tv. I was shocked their isn't a bad seat in the house. They man that we got the tickets from told us to watch out for right handed batters foul balls. Sure enough we had 7 come in our direction. We weren't fortunate enough to get one though. Hopefully we can go again next year. I would do it again no doubt. It is so much more fun watching it in person rather than on TV.

All and all it was a good day!!! The day before Hans had asked me who was going to play and I told him Red Sox and the Celtics. He laughed so hard and said that I knew nothing about baseball and I was like ya cause they are a basketball team huu... He shared with my whole family. But I did see the Celtics play ok well it was a kid wearing a jersey playing buckets for money but that counts right. :-) Here are some pictures ENJOY!!!!

Catching up on us

2008-06-21T07:35:00.001-07:00

Things are going really good out here in Connecticut. Work is work and I am loving it. It doesn't change much. Davids on the other hand changes constantly. He has been home for about 2 months this is the longest he has been home consistently since moving back to Connecticut. I have loved having him home. He still has his duty days where he stays at the boat for 24 hrs. and if it lands on a week day he has to finish out his work day but I would much prefer that then him being gone all the time. He will be home for a little bit longer then he will leave again. We are coming home in September YEAH!!! But will return with some busy months for David ahead of us. He will start his 6 month deployment at the end of this year. Sad days... This year has gone by so fast and I hope that the 6 month will also.

But on a lighter note and the whole reason for me writing this Blog is to tell you all that David ranked up about 2 weeks ago. So what does that mean I bet it the question that you are all asking. Well... He is now the 3rd from the top in his division. He is a seconds class petty officer E-5. I would say that he is having more responsibilities but he has been doing E-5 work for about 6 months now so he is now getting paid for the work that he is doing. I am so proud of him and all his hard work. I tell him sometimes that if he didn't work so hard and had bad work ethic he could come home earlier. But I would much rather have him work hard even if it does make his days longer than those he works with. I am so proud of all of his accomplishments since joining the navy. This next year will be full of big decisions for us. We have to decide if we are going to re-enlist while he is out to see or wait till he is home again. With that re-enlistment he would be shore duty. It would be like him having a civilian job almost. He would have duty once a month but our other choice is much more appealing. David is going to a councilor for school on Monday and from their will decide if he should go officer. The XO on the boat came up to him and told him that he had put a package in for him to become Officer. It opened alot of possibilities for us. The XO isn't able to do this but it was his way of telling David that he should not be enlisted but should be an officer. It was a HUGE compliment for him to receive. So now we are looking into that. He will still have to do his 6 month deployment because they only enroll for the program once a year and the dead line has passed but if he does do it they will send him to school to get his Associates degree and start officers school that is all he would be doing is focusing on school no more going out to sea!! YEAH!!! But after that he would have to go back on a boat for another 1-2 years before he could leave the navy. It is a huge opportunity for him and I know that he would do well with it. Only time will tell for us to see if this is the right thing for him to do. I am so proud of my husband and all he has done and will continue to do. That is the gist of our lives. Mine is simple and doesn't' have alot of change work wise but Davids is enough for the both of us. I love you all and hope things are going well with all of you.

Long time No post...

2008-05-16T16:40:00.000-07:00

(Sorry I couldn't get this below)

So I'm sitting here looking at everyones page and thinking... Does everyone click on my page to see if i updated??? Because that is what i do. So I've decided to give you something to read.

Not a lot has changed here. I am still at the Day Care and loving it more and more everyday. We just got a new baby. She is 6 weeks old and the cutest thing. She makes me want to start our family even more. Just a little over a year until David is done with his 6 month deployment and then we will. David is home now. YEAH He has been gone for pretty much 3 months with a 10 day break. But now he is home for a month and a half and maybe even longer. I am hoping that he will stay in for the July underway so that he can spend some time with my Parents who are coming out July 5-13 (which i am so excited about!!!)

While David was out they pulled into France and he was able to spend 4 days wondering around. He wasn't able to go to Paris because it would have cost about 250 just for the train ride. He said that things are really expensive. But he bought me a picture that I absolutely love. If it was from America I would have asked why on earth he bought it for me but it is from France so you have to love it... He also got me perfume which was wrapped perfectly and no tape was used on it. When I wrap I use more tape than wrapping paper i think. It smells so good I think the smell lasts longer than ours does. Which is good because I love the smell..

My friend Laura was able to bring her camera down on the Pier with her and I wish I would have gotten a picture of the sub but I forgot to ask her if she would get one of us in front of it. Next Deployment I guess... That is the only time that you are able to take a picture of any sub is when it is coming back from a Deployment. But I will post the picture that she did take and also one of the picture from France.

Other than that not much has been going on. We are doing small projects on our house so i will post pictures of that soon.

just a quick note

2008-03-21T06:44:00.000-07:00

Just wanted everyone to know that my surgery went amazingly well. I was scheduled for 2 hrs. but completed it less than an hour. Then i was supposed to be in recovery from the anesthesia for 1.5 hrs. but was out 45min. later and in my room for 1 hr. but I was headed on from the hospital not more than 30 minutes later. When David and I got to the hospital he was telling me that I would have to leave in a wheel chair. I told him I would not leave in one but he insisted I would. So they had him go get the car while they got a wheel chair for me. They came in with one and I asked if that was my chariot and jumped out of the chair that I was in to move to the wheel chair. She was like wow I haven't seen someone get up like that after a gal bladder surgery are you sure you need the wheel chair. I said I don't think I need it but I will do what you want me to. We walked out and David was surprised they let me walk out. But that just goes to show how well I am doing. I am super surprised but feeling very blessed. Thank you all for your prayers. Love you all so much!!!

Update time

2008-03-15T13:26:00.001-07:00

So a quick update of our lives. I had the best birthday present given to me yesterday because David came home a couple days earlier that he was supposed to so I was able to spend it with him. But he is only home for about 10 days and will be leaving again to go on a mini deployment. He gets to go to France. Sad day that I can not go with him :-( Maybe i can sneak in his sea bag...

He was going to stay home for the next 2 months but they are having the last big inspection on the boat and they want him to be their so that he can ace his DC stuff yet again. Which is good. But his new chief even told him, "Sorry your getting punished for doing a good job with your DC gear". He would have been doing schools that would have helped him with life when he isn't in the Navy. But hopefully he will be able to do them when he comes back. That way he will get a 'outstanding' on his DC and will also be able to do the schools to help for when he gets a Civilian job.

I am working at the Day Care which I am still loving. I am going in for Gal Bladder surgery on the 20th. I am feeling pretty good about it right now. David will be home for that and he will be off for 4 days afterwards to take care of me.

For those of you who know my friend Laura or have heard me talk about her, she had her baby today at 4:30am. 8lbs. 2oz. and 18in. long. He is so stinking cute. His name is Kallin. It will be fun to watch him grow and to watch how her two daughters interact with him. I took her daughters Tate and Shaye for the weekend a couple weeks ago so that her and her husband could get some things done in their house before Kallin came. I put Tate's hair in curlers and she looked so dang cute so here are some pictures of the girls that weekend and when I get some of Kallin I will add them also.

This is Shaye This is Tate and her curlers This is her curls

HAIR CUT TIME!!!

2008-03-15T13:16:00.000-07:00

This is my hair cut... Laura and I were out driving around wondering what we could do that would be productive for the time she had without kids so we decided to cut our hair. Her husband called and asked where we were because it took a little more time than we had thought it would but it was fun. Laura's turned out well... Not so great but I love mine. It is just choppy in the back. Totally not straight by any means though I think she got scissor happy on one side of my head but it still looks good.

What I do while David is away

2008-02-23T08:34:00.000-08:00

So I am FINALLY hanging up some curtains in my house. I have had these curtains since before we moved here. They used to be in our bedroom in Portsmouth, NH. I have just been way to Lazy to buy a rod. But I did it and it looks great. Who needs a guy to hang up curtain rods. David will be so proud of me. I hardly do anything to the house when he isn't here. I let him make all the decisions a make the holes in the walls. That way if they are in the wrong spot it isn't my fault :-) He is really good about it I know that he wishes that I would do more but I am just to nervous of doing the wrong thing. But I think this was a safe thing to do. Next to attack is curtains for my Front Room. But I have no idea what color. I am waiting for the Bed Bath and Beyond to open up in the mall. We have had a gift card since we got married and the closest one right now is 1.5hrs away.

I Love my husband

2008-02-18T18:45:00.001-08:00

Well David is gone again for 5 weeks. He will only be home for a little over a week and then gone for 2 months so we aren’t seeing much of each other. But he is really good at writing me so it makes it a little easier. David has been the DCPO (Damage Control Petty Officer) for almost a year. When he got this job in Portsmouth, NH it was in very sad shape. The guy that had it before him didn't have anything in order and on top of that the boat was being torn apart so everything was in shambles, and the quy was leaving so he had no help. When he got this job he was excited about it but scared when he saw what he was walking into. Their were days when he was very discouraged about it but i kept telling him that one day it would pay off. Well the day has come. He has worked very hard for this and I am so proud of his work ethic and all that he has done to accomplish it. When he goes out to sea they run drills and have inspections. Some of the drills they run have to do with his DC. Which is fire fighting and the 'incase of emergency you need this' stuff. The boat takes great pride in being the cleanest boat in the east coast fleet and now they can also take great pride in having the best DC in the submarine fleet. They were awarded a plaque that they will keep on the boat, but this was awarded to the men that are higher up than David. They helped a little but afterwards his chief came up to him and said "This should have gone to you" "Will we get it again in 2008?" David was bummed that he didn't get recognition for all his hard work but I know that he will work just as hard to get it in 08 as long as he is the DCPO (which I think this is the last underway that he will be) But he will work hard to help the new guy. His LPO Leading Petty Officer gave him 96 hrs. liberty, which means he can have 4 days off whenever he chooses to use it. Which will be SO nice to have 4 days with him. But the BIG thing that I am SO proud of him for getting is the NAM which is the Navy Achievement Medal. It is hard to get, his chief put him in for one. He got a ribbon and a certificate. His Captain wrote this on his Certificate: Department of the Navy This is to Certify that The secretary of the navy has awarded the Navy and Maine Corps Achievement Medal to Machinist’s mate 3rd class (SS) David J. Harding, United States Navy for Professional achievement in the superior performance of his duties while serving as a member of Auxiliary division aboard USS Hartford(SSN 768) from July to December 2007. Petty Officer Harding consistently performed his demanding duties in an exemplary and highly professional manner. His exceptional level of knowledge and skillful management of divisional DCPO's as the ship’s damage control petty officer maintained the ship's damage control equipment and systems in superior condition allowing Hartford to excel in all assigned tasking. His efforts resulted in recognition for Damage control excellence and receipt of the CSS-4 Red "DC" award for 2007. His rapid qualification and proficiency as auxiliary man of the watch, keen attention to detail and exceptional personal integrity, set the standard among his peers and led to his selection as Junior Sailor of the Quarter for the fourth quarter of 2007. Perry officer Harding's outstanding technical ability, personal initiative, and unswerving devotion to duty reflected great credit upon himself, and were in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.

I am so proud of him for all his accomplishments that he has on the boat. He is a hard worker even when the work is more than called for. I love that his worth ethic is so good. I am so proud to be his wife. I love him so much and can not wait to see what he will take and learn with his new jobs on the boat. I know that he will continue to work hard and learn all he can for himself and for his family.
Thank you all so much for your love and support that you give to David and I it makes it alot easier. Thank you mom and dad for letting me call you every night and for all your words of encouragement. David and I appreciate it so much. We love you all!

Pickles

2008-02-06T14:42:00.000-08:00

Well... For those of you who eat at any fast food restaurant be careful what you ask for. David and I went to Burger King tonight on our way home and he asked for a #4 (Jr. Whopper) with cheese no tomato, no onion, and extra pickles. Well the Extra Pickles is where we get into trouble. So I open up the hamburger and I start eating the smaller of the two not looking at what is on it. David's hamburger had two patties on it so it would have been the larger one, so i figured i was safe. Well i start eating it and it has bacon on it and he says that is mine so i give it to him a bit confused because the other sandwich is MUCH larger than the one he was now eating. I open it up and I find not a little extra pickle but a lot of extra pickles. Enough for i would say 10 sandwiches all with extra pickles. I had 38 pickles on the inside and 1 on the outside that made my bread super soggy. It was not a very good hamburger to say the least. All the pickles made my burger cold and my bread soggy. And to top it off i had no cheese. It was a very sad BK run but it gave us a good laugh.

How to stimulate submarine life in your own home

2008-01-19T14:30:00.000-08:00

David sent this to me last night and i was laughing so hard. So here is a glimps into how you make make you lif into a submarine life.... I hope you enjoy...

How to Simulate Submarine Life in your own Home:

Obtain a dumpster. Paint it black, weld all the covers shut except one which can be bolted closed from the inside. Hitch it to the back of your wife's mini van. Gather 12 friends and bolt yourselves inside and let your wife pull it around for several weeks while she does the errands.
Sleep on the shelf in your closet. Replace the closet door with a curtain. Six hours after you go to sleep, have your wife whip open the curtain. shine a flashlight in your eyes, and mumble "Sorry, wrong rack".
Don't eat any food that you don't get out of a can or have to add water to.
Paint all the windows on your car black. Drive around town at high speeds with your wife standing up in the sunroof shouting course and speed directions to you.
Renovate your bathroom. Build a wall across the middle of your bathtub and move the shower head down to chest level. When you take showers, make sure you shut off the water while soaping.
Repeat back everything anyone says to you.
Sit in your car for six hours a day with your hands on the wheel and the motor running, but don't go anywhere.
Put lube oil in your humidifier instead of water and set it to "High".
Don't watch T.V. except movies in the middle of the night. Also, have your family vote on which movie to watch, then show a different one.
Record The Sound of Music and show it at least every other night.
Don't do your wash at home. Gather your neighbors clothes along with yours, pick the most crowded Laundromat you can find, and do the neighborhood laundry in a single washer and dryer. Make sure that 12% of the laundry is lost and 20% of the finished laundry is incorrectly distributed to the wrong neighbor.
Leave lawnmower running in your living room six hours a day for proper noise level. (For Engineering Divisions)
Have the paperboy give you a haircut.
Take hourly readings on your electric and water meters.
Sleep with your dirty laundry.
Invite guests, but don't have enough food for them.
Buy a broken exercise bicycle and strap it down to the floor in your kitchen.
Buy a trash compactor and use it once a week.
Store up garbage in the other side of your bathtub.
Wake up every night at midnight and have a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on stale bread, if anything. (Optional--canned ravioli, cold soup, or cherry peppers)
Make up your family menu a week ahead of time without looking in your food cabinets or refrigerator.
Set your alarm clock to go off at random times during the night. When it goes off, jump out of bed and get dressed as fast as you can, then run out into your yard and break out the garden hose. Once a month and then put them back together.
Use 18 scoops of coffee per pot and allow it to sit for 5 or 6 hours before drinking. Invite at least 85 people you don't really like to come and visit for a couple of months.
Store your eggs in your garage for two months and then cook a dozen each morning.
Have a fluorescent lamp installed on the bottom of your coffee table and lie under it to read books.
Periodically check your refrigerator compressor for "sound shorts".
Put a complicated lock on your basement door and wear the key on a lanyard around your neck.
Lock wire the lug nuts on your car.
When making cakes, prop up one side of the pan while it is baking. Then spread icing really thick on one side to level off the top.
Every so often, yell "Emergency Deep", run into the kitchen, and sweep all pots/pans/dishes off of the counter onto the floor. Then, yell at your wife for not having the place "stowed for sea".
Put on the headphones from your stereo (don't plug them in). Go and stand in front of your stove. Say (to nobody in particular) "Stove manned and ready". Stand there for 3 or 4 hours. Say (once again to nobody in particular) "Stove secured". Roll up the headphone cord and put them away. Write a controlled work package to change the oil.

DRUM ROLL PLEASE

2008-01-11T17:30:00.002-08:00

I know... I know... You never thought it would happen but it has I have FINALLY posted pictures of our house. But you have to promise to continue to look at my page every now and then because i am starting to get into this blog thing. So we have a basement also but it isn't pictured because it is a mess of boxes that we are still deciding weather to we want to save them for out move or if we want to buy new ones (or steal them off the side of the road like i did before from navy housing on bulk days) :-) But when it starts looking better i will post a picture.

Things that we have done have been to repaint our bedroom and David put in our pantry, it was an empty hole and now it is AMAZING!!! Thank you so Much!!! It was nice to get our food put away.

So our plans for this house/condo is to re-do the kitchen, put in an outlet for the island and to also put in a dishwasher. I miss that a lot. We are also going to re-do the cabinets. We are planning on putting a cabinet on the far side of the dining room wall and then that one will be done. Oh and curtains but all of that will have to wait that is our 2nd to biggest project. Our biggest is finishing the basement. It will be a lot of work but it will be a good thing for resale and our smallest of the big projects is to carpet the front room so that when we do have kids (one of these days) they will have a soft place to crawl.

We love this house so much. I was asked the other day if I ever get scared being by myself and I have yet to freak out about that. It has such a good feeling about it and it helps that when Kim changed to locks on the door he put the dead bolt right side up and the door knob upside down. I figure no one is going to take the time to find out how to unlock a door upside down... Thanks Kim...

On a side note... David is out to sea again. We figure that he will be gone all of 4.5 months this year and will have a 6 month deployment at the end of that... So I am going to try to keep myself busy. This year is going to fly by so fast though. We hope all is going well for everyone else and we send our love.

Check out my Slide Show!

2008-01-11T17:30:00.001-08:00

Check out my Slide Show!

2007-12-28T08:48:00.001-08:00

New York

2007-12-28T08:00:00.002-08:00

So I am figuring out this blog stuff and how to get pics. on so... This is the first. I know it should be of my house but they are coming soon...

Chelse' came out to visit us for a week and a half so we did what anyone who lives close to new york would do. We took her. We had so much fun. We went to Time Square first and walked around for awhile. We went to the Hershey and M&M Place which we loved going to. Then it was off to the 9/11 site. It was all covered so you could only sneak peaks through tears in the plastic. But they are going to build a beautiful building their. Right now they are still removing rubble.
From their we went to Battery Park where we bought some purses and saw the Statue of Liberty. It was dark so we couldn't get a very good picture of it from where we were.
We were going to take her to China Town but it got dark a lot faster then we thought it would so while we were at Battery Park we ran into some purses that we could buy so... We did... They are so cute!!! And she got a small glimps of what goes on in China Town... Purse, Prada, Gucci, Chanell... They would whisper and we would follow... I know i know not super safe but if you could see these purses...
And last but not least we went to the Rockefeller center where we saw the tree and got pictures of the ice skating rink. It is a 2 hr. wait and only 150 people can go on at a time for 1 hr. And you pay a lot for it. I can't remember the exact amount but the line was HUGE!!! We couldn't get close enough to get pictures so a police man did it for us.

All in all we had a lot of fun in New York. We came back smelly and needed a shower but that comes with the experience. I love going to New York. Every time it is like new. You can't see everything in one day but you don't want to stay for more then 1 day at a time. So you have to break it up. SO Chelse' you need to come back so you can see the rest...

HE IS HOME!!!

2007-11-04T07:39:00.000-08:00

David is HOME YEAH!!! I am loving having him home... It has been a lot of fun. We had his Birthday party yesterday. Well we just had friends over for dinner but it was still fun!!! He is taking off the next week. I'm not sure what he will be doing for a week since I will be at work... But I'm sure he will find something to entertain himself... We will post pictures of our house this week sometime. We have decided to pay some bills off rather than paint our house. It's kinda sad but it will be nice not to have the debt anymore...
David will be home for a little over a month and then gone for 3 weeks but he will be home for Christmas. Hopefully Chelse' will be coming out to join us for our first Christmas in our home... It will be loads of fun... But other than that not anything to exciting is going on.

2007-10-24T15:08:00.000-07:00

SO... David is coming home in a little less then a week. YEAH!!!! I'm so excited it has been a super long month. I've miss him so much But I have kept myself busy working and working and working some more. I love work. The kids are all so cute! But I promise that after David comes back I will put pictures up of our house. I PROMISE. He is going to paint it and make it look real nice... SO then I will post them. Maybe I will do some before and afters so you get the whole picture. I'm so excited. David is going to take 9 days off work. I will be taking off a couple days to help with the work. Actually I'm hoping that he will have it all done when I take work off so we can just relax together... LOL... I'm so happy with life and how it has turned out. We are very happy. We are very busy and don't see much of each other when he is gone but I wouldn't have it any other way. Thank you so much for all of your love and support. We truly appreciate it.

Updating our info.

2007-10-07T20:34:00.000-07:00

So I am not very good at staying on top of this. I just read every ones and mine is super boring. I apologize for that but not much changes here. I am still at the Day care working. I love my job and for the most part I love the kids. We have some that it really depends on the day. We have Brooke the bitter, David the Red head that has a look of 'And what are you going to do about it', Isaiah who looks like Mowgli off of Jungle Book, Sejal is from India so she speaks in two different languages so we shake our heads a lot of the time, Saffron who I don't think she has a care in the world, Jessica who is perfect. I'm the only one that can understand her. Roan our screamer, Lucas will be leaving us soon to the Preschool room, Seth is our baby he just sits around and watches everyone else have fun, and Presley who is named after... Yup you guessed it Elvis Presley. She has a sister Graceland and their parents basement is total Elvis stage and all... They keep me busy which is good since David is yet again out to sea...
I never write when he is home, so your probably thinking 'He came back?'. He was home for 2 weeks which one of the 2 weeks he was working 8am-8pm so we didn't see a lot of each other during the day. He is out for a month right now he would love emails if you would like to send him one he would love it. His email is hardindj@hartford.navy.mil He is pulling into port at some point so I will be able to talk to him. I'm way excited about that.
I am doing Mary Kay now on top of day care so that keeps me even more busy and then my church callings which are teaching Relief Society and doing Activity Days for the girls. I am having fun with both of them. I will be doing my first Activity Day on the 16th. I hope they have fun. I have had fun planning it.
What else is going on... OH David built me a pantry before he left. I LOVE IT!!! I will have to find my camera and put some pictures up. It is so nice to be OUT of boxes we only have 3 more left. Books, Quilts, and Coats. But we are getting their. David is taking a week and a half off when he gets back. So I am going to put him to work painting while I am at work... He'll need something to do right?? :-)
But we are loving life, missing home, and keeping busy. Not much changes around here but I will write more often to keep you all updated. I love reading yours so I'm sure you like to read mine also. If anyone is ever on the east coast and needs a place to stay we would love to have you.

New news

2007-09-09T13:28:00.000-07:00

David has been out to sea for the past week and i am going crazy without him. He will be back sometime this week though so that will be good. I am trying to keep myself super busy so that I don't have a lot of time to think about it. It is working so far. I got a job at the day care and work 45 hrs. a week and I am now a Mary Kay consultant. A lady that is in my ward sucked me into it... lol... It will be fun though and it will give me something to do while David is out to sea and has duty. I'm excited about it. It will be just a small part time thing to keep me busy. I just was called to be a teacher in the Relief Society and the Activities Day Director for the girls. I am very excited about both of my callings and they will be great.

I love my job and the kids are great. After working a day they asked me to be the teacher of the new toddler group. I am way excited about that.

David is doing good... He keeps busy also. Not that he has a choice... He will be home for about 2 weeks and then leave again for about a month. It is hard but we are so blessed in our lives.

Introduction

2007-08-21T10:44:00.000-07:00

David and I were married a year ago on August 18. We were living in Kittery, Maine for the past year. We loved Maine. David's boat was in the Portsmouth New Hampshire dry dock getting a face lift... His boat was gutted and put back together with up to date parts.

We bought a house in Oakdale, Connecticut on the 17th of July. I moved here at the beginning of August and David stayed in Maine till the boat left. Finally we are together in Connecticut!!! YEAH!!! David had to travel with the boat for about a week and before that he was pretending to be underway for a week and a half. David is so glad to be out of the boat! I'm not sure what he will do when he has to be on it for 6 months. I don't know what I will do when he has to do his 6 month tour... Hopefully I will be going to Australia when they pull in... That is about the only good thing about him going out for 6 months is that we will see the world...

David will be going in and out for the next couple months and I will be working at a day care and going to school. I am not completely sure in what yet. Either CNA classes or as a Medical Transcriptions were still looking into that... But we are doing good. Loving life, Loving being married, Loving our home and depending on the day David is loving his job. :-) We are have been very blessed with our jobs and our home and every other aspect of our lives.