Friday, December 2, 2011

Follow Friday - Have Some Weekend Genealogy Fun

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Are you in the Christmas card, family letter and gift shopping mode yet?  It's December, step away from the keyboard, put down your ahnentafel, and have a life.  That's my wife's advice, of course.  Me?  I just want to have some Genealogy Fun this weekend. I recommend:

1) Listen to the Geneabloggers Radio show tonight (Friday night, 9 p.m. ET, 8 p.m. CT, 7 p.m. MT and 6 p.m. PT) hosted by Thomas MacEntee. This week's topic is "Capturing Family Memories – All Year Round."  The special guests include:

Stefani Twyford, President and Founder of Legacy Multimedia in Houston, Texas who will help us understand why preserving family memories is so important and various methods you can use;
Jennifer Shoer of The Scrappy Genealogist blog who’ll explain some of the methods and resources she uses to capture family memories;
*  Lorel Kapke of Sort Your Story whose product can help you organize not just your genealogy data but photos, stories and more!

2) Listen to the FGS Radio - My Society show on Saturday (2 p.m. ET, 1 p.m. CT, 12 noon MT, 11 a.m. PT) hosted by Thomas MacEntee.   This week's topic is "Insider’s Guides to Genealogy."  The special guest is:

Kathryn M. Doyle, of the FGS-member society California Genealogical Society and Library in Oakland, California. Kathryn will explain how her society was able to compile and publish their Insider’s Guide to California Genealogy in an amazingly short six-week period!
Society Highlight:  We’ll be highlighting FGS member society, San Luis Obispo County Genealogical Society in our weekly Society Spotlight feature.
3) Check out the recent FREE Webinars on:

* LegacyFamilyTree:
*** A Closer Look at Google+, by Dan Lynch (Legacy Family Tree, free until 12 December)
*** Celebrate the Holidays and Share Family History with Heritage Collector software, by Kathleen Bitter (Legacy Family Tree).
*** Creating a Shareable CD with Legacy and Passage Express software, by Jefferson Shupe (Legacy Family Tree)
*** Let Your Voice Be Heard in the Digital Conversation, by Drusilla Pair (Legacy Family Tree, available free until 5 December)
*** Exploring FamilyLink.com and WorldVitalRecords.com by their founder, Paul Allen. (Legacy Family Tree)
*** "Newspapers for Genealogists: Using GenealogyBank.com to document every day of your ancestors' lives" with Tom Kemp. (Legacy Family Tree)
*** "Organizng for Success" with Karen Clifford (Legacy Family Tree)
*** "The Power of DNA in Unlocking Family Relationships," with Ugo Perugo (Legacy Family Tree)

* RootsMagic Webinars (all free) available at http://www.rootsmagic.com/Webinars/.  Recengtly added:

*** What's New in RootsMagic 5
*** Fun Family Gifts with RootsMagic, Personal Historian, and Family Atlas

* National Genealogical Society (NGS) Videos (some are free to view) at http://www.ngsgenealogy.org/cs/videos_online

* Thomas MacEntee's Explorinars, including:

*** Easy Website Creation (free to view).
*** Evernote - Easy Note Taking UPDATED (free to view)
*** Facebook Pages vs. Facebook Groups (free to view)

* Ancestry.com's YouTube Channel has 115 items on it now, including (free to view):
*** Ancestry.com LIVE: Unlock the Secrets of the 1790 - 1840 US Census Records  with Anne Mitchell*** Ancestry.com LIVE: Search with Ancestry Anne with Anne Mitchell
*** Ancestry.com LIVE: One Question with the Barefoot Genealogist with Crista Cowan
*** Ancestry.com LIVE: Lorraine's 5 Tips for Online Grave Digging with Lorraine Bourne
*** Ancestry.com LIVE: How do I use newspapers on Ancestry.com to find out more about my ancestors? with Crista Cowan
*** Ancestry.com LIVE: How Do I Find My Ancestors Before 1850? with Crista Cowan.
*** Ancestry.com LIVE: How to dress up your family tree ...for the holidays! with Anne Mitchell.
*** Ancestry.com LIVE: How to Find Your Civil War Roots on Ancestry.com with Anne Mitchell.
*** Emigration & Immigration Records Online with Crista Cowan @ Ancestry Day San Francisco
*** Find Them Fast: Secrets to Searching Ancestry.com with Laura Dansbury @ Ancestry Day San Francisco
*** Five Tips for Digging Up Answers at Ancestry.com with Jeanie Croasmun @ Ancestry Day San Francisco

4) Respond to my Saturday Night Genealogy Fun challenge, posted on www.geneamusings.com soon after 12 noon Pacific time (that's 1900 GMT for those who understand time zones).

5) Go to a local genealogical society program. You might want to check out what's offered in your area.

6) Go to a local or close repository with genealogy and family history material. Do some research in traditional resources or order FamilySearch microfilms online with original source records.

7) Do some online research in the latest record collections at:

* FamilySearch (free, https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/list),
* Ancestry ($$, http://www.ancestry.com/cs/reccol/default),
* Fold3 ($$, www.fold3.com),
* WorldVitalRecords ($$, www.WorldVitalRecords.com),
* American Ancestors ($$, www.AmericanAncestors.org),
* GenealogyBank ($$, www.GenealogyBank.com),
* Archives ($$, www.Archives.com)

8) Add content (names, dates, places, notes, images, sources, etc.) to your genealogy software program. I still have two inches of paper collected from my vacation, and more from before that, and will try to enter some of it into my database this weekend.

9) Spend time with your family doing fun things.  I'm taking my wife to Catalina for two days to celebrate her birthday this weekend..

Go to a local cemetery and clean stones, take gravestone pictures, or transcribe epitaphs for your local society, for Find-a-Grave, or a similar online service.

11) GO SHOPPING for genealogical products or services, or for technology products, for yourself, or for a gift for that special genealogy friend. Online or in a store - go for it!

Whatever you decide, please tell us about your genealogy endeavors on a social network or in a blog post. You never know when your experiences may stimulate or encourage others to do useful genealogy work.

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