It's a New Year!

January 30th came around faster than I anticipated.  I've commited to a number of projects this next year and I've decided that this blog would be a good place to record my experiences, my progress and my stumbling blocks along the way.  I only have six blogs to write here on the Worldwide Genealogy Project and lots of plans and goals for the year so hopefully, writing every two months will be enough to track my progress on this journey through 2015.

I've been working to complete my families genealogy since around 2005.  Initially, I had the tremendous good fortune to make contact with two cousins through the message boards at Ancestry.com.  My fathers father was one of three brothers who immigrated to the United States from Germany in the early 1900's.  Each married and had children although their relationships with one another were not close.  Between myself and the two women I connected with, we were able to connect back to each one of these three men.  Learning about their grandfathers and putting that knowledge together with what I knew about my grandfather started my genealogical pursuit.  At this point, I am deep into my mothers heritage.  I've learned that the more children in a family, the easier it is to trace.  My mother and her mother before her were only children and left fewer clues, fewer records, fewer photos, etc.  In an effort to put our story down in print and make it "come alive", I've joined the "52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks" Project put forth by Amy Johnson Crow at http://www.nostorytoosmall.com/posts/announcing-52-ancestors-in-52-weeks-2015-edition/ -  which is pushing me to study one specific ancestor at a time, recording dates, events and tales of family lore.  I must say that while daunting to write about one ancestor each week, doing so puts a more human face on them and helps me to understand more about their lives in context.

Another commitment that just had to be made was to the "Genealogy Do-Over",  https://www.facebook.com/groups/genealogydoover/    a challenge put forth by Thomas MacEntee.  After several years, I have stacks of notes and timeline information just laying around.  I need to organize my office, the stacks I've mentioned and my data files in particular.

I also enjoyed writing brief commentary for the 2015 FGS Ambassadors -  https://www.facebook.com/groups/230809487114846/  

 As I had spent a week in Salt Lake City last summer at the wonderful LDS Family History Library, I felt able to contribute some information as to where to go, where to eat, what to see, pack, etc.  That particular writing obligation ends this month with the start of the FGS Conference.

I do have a habit of biting off more than I can chew and I am going to try to limit this years activities to those aforementioned.  Fulfilling my obligations as a contributor is a joyous but time consuming task but I also want to reserve the time to read the work of others as well as to continue my own research.  So, I'm done for this month.  I share this time slot with a wonderful German researcher, Ursula Krause, who you will be hearing from next month on this date.  I look forward to reading her blog entry as well as all of yours.  I hope you've enjoyed my effort and I'll look forward to greeting you once more in March!