I have had a LibraryThing account for a few years.  I homeschool, so we have enough books to fill a small town library, I kid you not.  Reading this made me realize that I haven’t used my membership to its full potential.  Now that I think about it, I haven’t updated my books since I started my membership – and I know that I have had a lot of books come in and out of my library since then.  I also haven’t taken the time to tag and categorize the books, which is the whole point of using the site – so that I can easily find what I have.  I will have to add this to my ever-growing list of things I need to do and I need to make sure to add a “genealogy” tag so that I can find all of those books when I’m looking for them.

I read though the GoodReads site and it is similar,but more geared towards book reviews and such.  The books that you have on your virtual shelf don’t have to actually be on your shelf at home.  It isn’t an organizational tool for your collection like LibraryThing is.  It is more of a way to find good books that you would enjoy.

I’m not complaining though.  It’s November and still warm enough for flip-flops during the day.

I have had to remind myself that even though it doesn’t quite feel like Christmas is coming, it will be here before I know it.

So, what’s the first thing that I did?  Christmas cards?  Nope, I still haven’t started those.  Shopping?  Haven’t started that either.  Decorations?  Still boxed up in the garage.

No, what I did was make my Christmas list – genealogy style.  Maybe my husband will read this and then he won’t have any excuses for having absolutely no idea what to get me.  It’s all right here babe!

I promise that I’ve been good this year!

• A slide scanner.  I took all of my mom’s slides when I was home this past summer and now they are languishing in my closet instead of hers.  I need to do something with them.  I promised her that I would get a scanner and turn them into images that we could actually see.  I’m really interested in seeing what kind of incriminating photos are amongst them.  I know for a fact that one of them is of us kids inside of a septic tank (not yet used, thankfully!).  What other crazy pics could be in there??
• A Flip Pal.  I saw these at the Atlanta Family History Expo and I’m convinced that I just have to have one.  Can’t you think of all of the instances where a small portable scanner would have been so nice to have??
• Evidence Explained! By Elizabeth Shown Mills.  I really need to read this.
• A GPS for my camera (a Nikon D-5000) so that I  can geo-tag my pics (think gravestones!)
• A gift certificate to Blurb.com so that I can make some family history books.
• A trip to Salt Lake City for a week of research (I’m dreaming!)
• John Edwards’ Civil War Pension file.  Wow, these records have gone up in price since I ordered one last.  I think they were $37 when I ordered most of them.  Now they are $75.  Yikes!  It kind of irks me too, because I’ve ordered his a few times over the years (when it was cheaper) and I always got the run-around since he died so late(1931).  They said that they didn’t have his records, but they do.  Now I need to order them yet again.  I think I need to speak with a human being though instead of the automated email request.
• Chocolate and Starbucks – because I swear it makes me think better and I’m sure that it will help me break through some of those brick walls.
• A framed family tree for our wall.
• A subscription to Footnote.com
• A subscription to Genline.com for my Swedish research
• The Hidden Half of the Family: A Sourcebook for Women’s Genealogy
• A ticket to the NGS Conference in Charleston next May. They go on sale in December!  I’ll be buying this one for myself…
• A DNA test from Family Tree DNA.

]]> http://www.climbingmyfamilytree.com/2010/11/26/52-weeks-to-better-genealogy-my-genealogy-christmas-wish-list/feed/ 4 http://www.climbingmyfamilytree.com/2010/11/17/52-weeks-to-better-genealogy-volunteer-potential/ http://www.climbingmyfamilytree.com/2010/11/17/52-weeks-to-better-genealogy-volunteer-potential/#comments Wed, 17 Nov 2010 12:00:25 +0000 Jenn http://www.climbingmyfamilytree.com/?p=937 Week 46: Assess your volunteer potential. The last two weeks’ challenges focused on volunteerism and local genealogy societies (which are also dependent on volunteers). Take a look at your skill set and determine what types of opportunities best suit you. Do you speak two languages? Maybe you can offer translation services. Do you only have free time after the kids are in bed? Perhaps an indexing project is best for you. Knowing your strengths can help shape your research process. If you take this challenge a step further and actually volunteer, give yourself a pat on the back. Bloggers are encouraged to assess and share their own skill sets, as well as any volunteer experiences they have.

Well, I am definitely still in the “growing my family tree” stage of life.  My kids are young and often underfoot.  I count myself lucky if I get a shower every day.  The majority of my genealogy endeavors are done in the wee hours of the night – in lieu of precious sleep.  I have a tub full of records that I have yet to re-enter into my program.  I have things that aren’t filed and organized.  I never thought of myself as someone who had time to volunteer at this time.

At the Atlanta Family History Expo this past weekend, I got to speaking to one of the representatives from FamilySearch and was made to realize that I could probably volunteer in my own way.  No, I’m not going to be sitting at the front desk of a quiet research library – (can you imagine the ruckus I’d cause with 5 kids?) But I could probably manage to do a batch of indexing here and there as I have time.

I had not realized that when you download a batch of records to index, you have a week to finish it – and it generally is about 30 minutes worth of work.  I could put in a load of laundry and index a record.  Then make some dinner and index a record.  Change a diaper and index a record.  Get the idea?  Even I could do a little something to give back to the genealogy community at large.  Spread out over a week, I could spare a minute here and there – or perhaps sit down all at once one evening when everyone is snoozing.

So, I took the plunge and downloaded the indexing platform.  It was quick and painless!  I then sat and indexed some WWII draft registrations while I was watching “Castle” – my current favorite TV show.   It was so easy!  I got 33 “points” – although I’m not quite sure what those are for yet.  It mentioned that these might eventually be used to access certain records.  For now, I guess that it is just a way to keep track of how much work I’ve done.

So, how can you volunteer your time or expertise to the genealogical community?

Join in the conversation.

Thanks to Amy Coffin from the WeTree Genealogy Blog for the 52 Weeks to Better Genealogy prompts!

I have also joined the local societies so that I can meet with other genealogists and learn through the speakers. I had the great luck of living in Monterey, CA for a number of years. We often had Karen Clifford as a speaker and our meetings were held at the Family History Center which had a plethora of books and microfiche available.

I just recently joined the Savannah Area Genealogical Association and have attended 2 meetings so far. It really makes me wish that I had family in the Low Country. The area is so full of historic significance and the cemeteries here are beautiful, but my family didn’t play a part in any of its history. Even if I don’t have any research interest in this area, I still like attending meetings and being around people with the same common interests.

I am also in the process of joining a local DAR chapter. It is going to be a long process, but I’m looking forward to attending the meetings and meeting some other genealogists in the area.

This is something that I really need to work on right now.

For a while, I was entering so much information into my database, so often, that I had no problems doing my source citations.  I rarely had to look at my cheat sheets to remember the proper way to do it.

I kind of took a few years off of genealogy research though.  I would work on it here and there, but didn’t really get a huge amount done.  Having babies and more babies and a husband deploy for a year left me with little free time.

Here I am with my research back in full swing and I find that I’m having difficulty in doing my source citations.  It’s taking me much longer to get them done (even with the Source writer in the Legacy program).  I still have a Rubbermaid full of papers to go through and re-enter into my program (I started my database over from scratch a number of years ago because I wanted everything properly entered and cited and still haven’t completely caught up).  I think I need to devote a couple of weekends to data entry and then I will be up to speed again on my source citations.

I have a copy of Evidence!, but I’m considering purchasing the Source Citations Quick Reference to keep close at hand while I’m entering my data.

It would have to be the very distant future though.  Truthfully, I am kept pretty busy tracing my own tree while home schooling my 5 kids.  I think that once they are older and I have some more free time to myself, then I might be able to pursue it.

I have never perused the Transitional Genealogists Forum on Rootsweb before. This is a forum for genealogists who are taking the steps to become professional genealogists.  There are many interesting questions posed here and I enjoyed looking through them.

One of the posts which I found particularly helpful to me was about whether or not you should trace the lines (a few generations back) of people who marry into your family.  In particular, this person had a great- granduncle who was married 3 times and never had children.  Her question was whether or not to research his spouses.

I tend to find out as much as I can about people who marry into my family.  I was glad to see that those who replied suggested that also.  Now I know that I’m not crazy and I’m not wasting my time.   I really think that you can get some of the best finds from people who married into the family and ended up with treasures.

So, now I can justify myself to my husband, who wonders why I would spend time on anyone not straight up my pedigree chart.

Investigate Family Search Pilot, which is part of FamilySearch.org. This is a wonderful collection of records which literally grows every day. In the middle left of the page is a link that says “Browse our record collections.” Click it and pick a region. Search collections outside your research interest. Investigate the types of records collected all over the world and see how they differ from those with which you are familiar. If you are a genealogy blogger, pick a type of record from another country and share your observations about it.

This challenge runs from Saturday, 6 March 2010 through Friday, 12 March 2010.

I decided to see what was available for Spanish records.

I have an ancestor from Spain, but I was lucky enough to have been handed a professional report on his line, from another researcher.  Lucky for me, that was in my first months of family history research.  It consisted of birth, baptismal, and marriage dates dating back to the early 1600s.

Since I already had this information, I have never bothered to look into Spanish records.

I went to the website and clicked on browse records.  I chose the region my family lived: Herencia, Ciudad Real, Spain and then their church: Nuestra Senora de la Concepcion.

I was amazed to see that the same records which the professional genealogist had used to research my family (which were on microfilm) are now digitized and available here online.

Even though the report was very thorough, it did not include deaths or confirmations.  This gives me something to search for!

Now if I had only studied Spanish instead of German and Russian.  It’s going to be hard for me to decipher the records, but I should be able to pick out the names with some work and then I can save the images and go from there.

There are indexes for the births and marriages, but not for the deaths and confirmations.  That means that I’m going to have to go through hundreds and hundreds of pages to find my ancestors.  It will be worth it though to get their death dates.

It looks like I have another “to do” to add to my list.  Although I don’t have enough time to sift through the pages at the moment, at least I now know that these records are readily available to me online.

What a great find!

Join in the fun at www.GeneaBloggers.com