Monday Genea-pourri, Week of March 4-17, 2019

Genealogists are great at documenting our ancestors’ lives but not so great documenting our own. I’ll write about what I’ve been doing the past week. This idea came from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing, who started this meme.

Genealogy

Blog Writing: I wrote the following blog post this week:

• 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks For week 11, I wrote about the large family that the Thomas & Mary Nicholas Davey had. Unfortunately out of the fifteen children, only seven lived to adulthood.
• I wrote about a slave distribution in my Thomas Haley family in Rankin County, Mississippi. It is important to share this information so the descendants of enslaved people might be able to make the connection.
• For Saturday Night Genealogy Fun, where we wrote about a favorite photo.

 Webinars/Study Groups/Lectures Attended: 

• I participated in the AmericaGen Study Group - Chapter 20 Local Land Records.
• I attended the Contra Costa County Genealogical Society’s meeting, where we learned from Dawn Kosmakos how to make better contact with our DNA matches.
• Monday Morning Group was small this month but we still had nice genealogy discussions.
• I watched Blaine Bettinger’s video on “Exploring the New Tools at AncestryDNA” and learned more about the ThruLines and DNA Match list.

I volunteered at the History Center, where I trained Peggy to give the county records room spiel for the Deer Valley High School tour on Wednesday. I did my monthly Desk Duty job at the California Genealogical Society’s library.

My own work centered on processing folders of old work. I have bits of information written on binder paper. Some of it has been entered, some are FHL film numbers that are either now digitized or still as films, so I am making new lists for visiting the Oakland FHC to view the digital film or the Family History Library in Salt Lake City to view the actual microfilm. In the process, I enter information in my RootsMagic program and file the paper and digital image. Sometimes, I find something that could then become a blog post, as I did this week with the Thomas Haley estate.

I participated in two Certification Study Groups this week. A new group has formed on Thursday nights (Thursday Cert Group) with people who have been on the clock for a while and some who are getting ready to. They are looking to me for guidance. My Friday Cert Group met and we discussed lineage applications.  I mostly listened, as I have not had any experience in this subject.

For my family writing activity, I met with my sister, Sabrina for dinner at Mangi Bene, to discuss what the book should look like and her possible participation. She brought the recipe book I made for her wedding so I’d have some baby pictures for the book. We had a nice evening talking about lots of other topics, too.

Other Activities

Went bird watching with Mt. Diablo Audubon at the newly reopened Mt. View Sanitary District’s ponds. We saw about three dozen birds but the growth around the ponds is new, so not as many as expected. On the way out, I drove over a curb to avoid an oncoming truck and damaged the tire. Had to wait for a tow truck and then get a new tire.

Spent the weekend at the Walnut Creek Model Railroad Society. Friday, I worked with the scenery committee cleaning the dust off of Mallard. Saturday and Sunday was an Open House & Show, and I ran trains, mostly passenger, for the crowds.

I had a bone-density scan this week. My back looks okay but there is some loss in my hips. Guess I better get to walking more!

Copyright © 2019 by Lisa S. Gorrell, My Trails into the Past. All Rights Reserved.