Just a wee posting to keep in shape

Just a short note before we go to bed. It's been rough the last few days with mom in the hospital. It's about all I can do just to get the homeschooling done and off to work. I work part time at a middle school as the afternoon librarian. I really like it and the hours are flexible enough to allow us still to homeschool. So hopefully someone will come along who can help me with the things we need to learn about blogging. Like how do you get all those pictures to look so great and the awesome graphics? Well I kind of like to learn hands on, so sink or swim.

Miss Kitty

This is one of our cats. Her name is Miss Kitty. She's the queen of the house and she won't let the rest of us forget it. -Seth

Before there was white tile there was...

Thought I would add some of the main bathroom before pictures. The tub and shower were separate. We hardly used the tub. The dust and spiders loved it though.

We had lovely burgundy and pink tile. I didn't mind the pink, but the burgundy was another matter all together.

We had the tub and shower combined and new tile put around the sink and tub/shower area. The old shower area became a closet. More pictures later. We haven't gone digital yet, so the kids and I are having to scan the pictures into the computer. That might take us some time. We'll post more as we get the pictures done.

About Mom and Dad and the rest of the Stockton Story

Hi, we're mom and dad to Seth and Tina, but Neil and Amanda to everyone else. We've been married 17 1/2 years. Where has all that time gone? For the past 10 years we've been living in California. Before that we lived in Virginia. We're both native to California, but met in Virginia. So yes, I had to go all the way to Virginia to meet a California boy. We were both in the Army at the time. We dated for 3 months and then got married. I wouldn't recommend it for anyone else, but it has worked wonderfully for us.

Our Stockton story began almost 7 years ago. We bought our little house as a bank repossession. It needed much TLC on the outside, but the inside was okay or so we thought.

Our first several years we just worked on the yard mostly. Three years ago Amanda's mother moved out from Mississippi to live with us. Her health was failing and she needed family support. Our 3 bedroom house began to seem really small after that addition. After many job ups and downs Neil finally settled into a career and we felt secure enough to begin some remodeling. A year and a half ago we decided the main bathroom really needed some help. We were beginning to notice some major defects. Once the walls were down we knew we were right. Rot had majorly settled in under the shower. We had separate tub and shower at that time. Our house was built in 1940 and had begun to show her age. We combined the tub and shower and turned the old shower into a much needed storage closet. There's still a few things left to do in there, but they're small things and the changes are great.

A year ago we decided a guest house was what we really needed. Prices of houses had skyrocketed in our region. A new house was out of the question and we couldn't really find one that we could all agree on. Besides we loved our house and it's location. It's only 2 minutes from work for Amanda and a jump onto the freeway for Neil. We had bought our house 6 years ago for $69,000. It had more than doubled in equity. So we began THE REMODEL.....

In Defense of Cookie

Yes, I did get rid of the dog. She was a very loving, adorable dog. It was a hard decision to make, but after killing our cat, Sam, and two neighbor cats we knew it was time to find her another good home. We did find her a wonderful place where she is much loved and the only pet of a mature couple. We still miss her and maybe someday will own another Corgi.

Tina in the first person point of view!

Hi, my name is Tina Kramer. I'm in 9th grade. My favorite subjects are History, Math, and P.E., especially P.E. Some of my favorite pass times are figure skating, reading, playing any sport, building robots, collecting animals, working on my school's farm, hanging with my friends, and bugging my mom (I think every teenager has that hobby). I had a dog named Cookie then my mom got rid of her. I love the outdoors and spend every nice day I get outside. My brother and I have contests to see who can shoot the most cans. (we're both pretty good so it's a hard competition.) That's about it. -Tina

In The Beginning

We thought it would be a good ESLR project for the kids. ESLR is Expected Schoolwide Learning Results. Mostly this is just technology education. So here we are blogging. We are a family of four + grandma. This is our 9th year homeschooling and our 6th year homeschooling through a charter school. Hence the ESLR. The kids and I thought it would be cool to chronicle our remodeling experiences from the last year and a half. So here we go.....