Happy New Year! My 2016 Genealogy Goals

I have set myself lots of genealogy goals for this year and I hope that by writing about them and publishing them I will hold myself accountable.

The Genealogy Do-Over 2016 led by Thomas MacEntee is a year long-mission to hone genealogy skills and develop best practices in research.  It also includes evaluating sources, using research plans and logs.  I will be attempting to create a new family tree without using past research except for records that I had previously sent for.  This tree will also be done with a different software program.

Dear Myrtle(Pat Richley-Erickson) of the Organized Genealogist is also starting a year-long project this one on organizing.  She is providing monthly check lists.  She has evidently been doing this for several years but it is new to me.  

DNA is an exploding field in the genealogy world and this year I want to learn more about reading the test results.  I am currently managing 4 accounts and need to learn more about which matches I should concentrate on.  I will be watching for webinars on DNA and reading Segment-ology by Jim Bartlett in addition to reading Judy G Russell’s blogs.

Each February Lynn Palermo of the Family History Writing Studio sponsors a Family History Writing Challenge.  You pick your own topics and commit to a specific number of words to write per day. (Your choice)  You can do a series of essays or one long story, writing parts of it daily.

In June I will be going to Salt Lake City with some local genealogists for a week at the Family History Library.  To that end I will be watching Michael John Neill’s webinar on preparing for a trip to the Family History Library.All that being said I also plan to write a blog post at least twice a week.  Some days I may post about how I am doing with my goals, some days it will be about my family tree!

See you soon!