Monday Genea-pourri, Week of August 22-28, 2022

I have completed one hundred twenty-nine (129) weeks of semi-lock down due to Covid-19. I had a much quieter week with little outside activity besides having lunch with Peter and visiting the History Center, doing phenology, and going to Train Club for our last of the month show.

 Genealogy

Blog Writing:

Timelines – A Great Way to Jumpstart Your Writing. I wrote about how I use timelines in my writing. This post was highlighted on Friday's Family History Finds.

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: What is Next on Your ‘To-Do’ List. I wrote about some of the items on my immediate to-do list.

Online Study Groups & Meetings Attended:
Monday was a busy day for meetings and study groups. Monday Morning Zoom met with eight or nine people and we had a good conversation about what we have been doing. I met with Jacqueline and talked about our Fitbits and how they can map out our walks. I also attended the AppGen founders meeting where we discussed which courses we were interested in for Spring 2023.  

Tuesday, I took the last class with the Family History Academy that I signed up for. There are three more classes, but I’ll be on vacation next month, so I didn’t sign up for them. This week was on handouts and it was the best of the three that I attended.

Wednesday, all four of us attended our bi-monthly Amigos meeting and we got caught up on what we have been doing the past month. Jacqueline and I spoke about our Turlock research trip. We made final plans for the retreat in November. Can’t wait! Later that evening, I attended the RootsMagic SIG and Stewart did a fantastic job of showing us how he enters citations. He’ll continue the conversation next month.

Sunday, I attended the Geno Book Club to discuss the first three chapters of The Birth Certificate. The next meeting is next Sunday and now I have 100 more pages to read! (US Open tennis starts Monday and will be a big distraction).

Client Work/Presentations:
I have worked exclusively on my AppGen Foundations 2 course this week. I’m working on the last lessons. Once finished, I’ll re-read and add more Genealogy Standards where appropriate. I do hope I’ve completed it by Friday when I’m to report on my goal for the Peer Group meeting.

Volunteer Work:
I volunteered at the History Center on Tuesday. I met the new volunteer and assigned her the task of entering the last books into the computer. Since she is a library student, I’ll have her help me add more keywords once we’re finished with the initial entries.  

Own Work:
I did no genealogy of my own family, except for writing up a research report to use as an example in my Foundations 2 course.

Webinars Viewed: I viewed quite a few webinars this week, some live and some pre-recorded. I still have about 15 to view the NGS Conference on-demand.

• FamilySearch.org--5 More Links You Have to Try by Devin Ashby
• Handouts: Useful and Memorable by Annette Burke Lyttle
• Need Help with Grammar and Punctuation? There's a Tool for That! by Cathie Sherwood
• Cemeteries Outside the Box: Virtual Graveyards and Other Tree-Building Tactics by Annie Brenneis
• Steamer Kate Explosion: Correlating Indirect Evidence to Identify and Correct and Error   by C. Ann Staley
• Follow the Trail of Records and DNA from Ireland to Oregon (1810-1860) by Karen Stanbury

Other: I’ve either watched Giants baseball or listened to the games while working this week. They’re still losing most games. So disappointing, especially after the great year they had last year.

I have walked a few times this week, trying to build up stamina for our trip next month. We walk 10-15K steps every day in New York City and climb the subway steps multiple times in the day.

We celebrated our 42nd anniversary on Tuesday by going out to eat on Thursday evening at a new Italian restaurant in town. The scampi was delicious.

I am reading: I focused on the book club book The Birth Certificate and only got a third of the way through it. It’s long. I watch “Singin’ in the Rain” again to have context while reading the book.

• The Birth Certificate: An American History by Susan J. Pearson
  
• Singin’ in the Rain: The Making of an American Masterpiece by Earl J Hess & Pratibha A. Dabholkar

Photos for this week:

Genealogists are great at documenting our ancestors’ lives but not so great at 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.

 Copyright © 2022 by Lisa S. Gorrell, My Trails into the Past. All Rights Reserved.