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I was born on October 1, 1970 in St. Andrews, Scotland (as my father was attending The University of St. Andrews). Following a year in Tennessee, my family moved in 1972 to Bristol, PA, where my father served as the pastor of Bristol Presbyterian Church. My earliest memory relates to the birth of my sister Kristin on December 24, 1973. When my father was called as the senior pastor of Wallingford Presbyterian Church in 1980, we moved to Wallingford, PA. With great relief, I graduated from Strath Haven High School in 1988; the year after graduation, I remained at home, working as a temporary and taking community college classes.

In November 1989, I moved to the Washington, DC metropolitan area and worked for MCI on a government contract to convert the Congressional field offices to MCI long-distance service. In August 1990, I enrolled as a full-time student at The George Washington University, where I participated in InterVarsity Christian Fellowship and worked as a residence hall receptionist; during my final semester, I also interned at the National Archives. I completed my coursework in December 1992, married Glenn Harden on January 2, 1993, and received my B.A. with a major in history and a minor in sociology on February 14, 1993.

I matriculated at George Mason University in May 1993 and graduated in May 1995 with an M.A. in "Teaching History." During my second year of graduate school and beyond, I worked as a research assistant for Drs. Jack Censer and Roy Rosenzweig, who are creating a world-history CD-ROM series. In 1996, I worked for a semester as a Program Instructor for Close Up, a civics-education organization. Later, I assisted Laura Gerlach in the opening of a Christian bookstore called The Gathering Place. In November 1996, I began as the Director of Youth Fellowships at Providence Presbyterian Church, after more than three years as a youth worker at my own church, Christ/Crossman United Methodist, and at a neighboring church, The Falls Church Episcopal.

In May 1998, I left Providence to pursue my long-held dream of obtaining a Ph.D.--but in psychology, a field which I had not previously studied. In an attempt to make up for that lack, I interned with Dr. Alan Zametkin at the National Institute of Mental Health for a year and also took several undergraduate psychology courses. I hope to begin graduate studies in psychology in the fall of 2001. In the meantime, we moved to Harrisonburg, VA in July 1999 to enable my husband Glenn to pursue his dream of becoming a teacher by obtaining his teaching certification from James Madison University.