What I do while David is away

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

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

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

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

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!

Check out my Slide Show!