Meet Mrs. Stoner

Hello, visitors. My name is Kelly Stoner, and this is my seventh year teaching English at Capital High School. I previously taught English at Skyview High School in Billings and at Hardin Middle School in Hardin. The Helena community is definitely the most "teacher-friendly" area I have been, and I thoroughly enjoy teaching in the Helena school district. The community's support for education is incredible, and it makes my job much easier than it would be otherwise.

I have been married for 16 years. My husband, Dennis, works fulltime for the National Guard, which is what brought us to Helena from Billings, where I lived most of my life. Over the last six years I have really come to enjoy the Helena area (getting a CostCo didn't hurt). This past year has been a difficult one for us.  In January my husband left for a year-long deployment to Afghanistan with his National Guard unit. They first went to Hawaii to finish training with a Hawaii unit that they were deploying with, and while there Dennis was diagnosed with a serious medical condition called neurofibromitosis, which causes benign tumors to grow off nerve endings in the body. Dennis had four tumors in his brain and two in his spinal column. Because of this, he was not able to go to Afghanistan with his unit, and he was not able to leave Hawaii because the military doctors would not clear him to fly until he had the two most dangerous tumors removed. I joined him in Hawaii on Feb. 3, and I did not return until July 30. Dennis returned Aug. 18. He still needs quite a bit of medical care, but at least he is home and on the mend. I will likely miss some time at work this year to be with Dennis for some of his medical treatment, but I should not have to be gone too much.

On a lighter note, my husband and I have four “kids” of the animal persuasion. Our dogs are Cleo and Max, both miniature pinschers. They can be a bit of a handful, but they can also be the sweetest little dogs in the world.  We also have two cats named Patra and Diesel. Most of the time, everyone gets along just fine.

Since I am an English teacher, it is safe to assume that reading is something I thoroughly enjoy. Unfortunately, also because I am an English teacher, I do not get to read for pleasure nearly as much as I would like. I also enjoy sports, especially football, and working on my house and my yard. I am a bit of a home improvement nut, so I spend a lot of time during the summer months on various projects in the house and the yard.  I also spend a lot of time tending to my flowers, which I really enjoy.

I could bore you with details of the life of an English teacher, but I will do you a favor and leave it here. I hope this web site proves to be beneficial to all who visit it.

Kelly Stoner