With the beginning of the new year, it's time to check-up on how well I did with my 2016 genealogy goals and establish the goals for 2017.
I am still working on the Do-over and will continue in the coming years. I want my tree to be as accurate as possible. As I re-evaluate information I continue to find new information. I will also continue to maintain my online trees as cousin bait. Last year they provided contacts in both Norway and Germany.
I will once again participate in the Family History Writing group sponsored by Lynn Palermo in February. Last year I got off to a pretty good start, but found some additional research was needed to continue the story. I have done the research and so I will resurrect the story and hope to finish it and publish it here.
On the DNA front, I am currently the manager of 5 kits and have had some minor success in connecting my brother and a known first cousin to another branch of my grandfather's family. The most common recent ancestor was my grandfather's grandfather. He was born in Norway in 1817. I will be watching and re-watching DNA seminars this year and I now have Blaine Bettinger's book "Guide to DNA Testing and Genetic Genealogy" so maybe this year I will become more comfortable with DNA analysis.
I am making tentative plans to go back to the Family History Library in April and the SCGS Jamboree in June. My trip to Salt Lake was a wonderful adventure and as is typical, I made substantial progress on a brick wall on Saturday afternoon! (my last day) I hope to go to Jamboree for both its educational opportunities and fellowship. I may also see my cousin while in California.
My greatest fail this year was with blogging. Far from the weekly posts I had hoped to do, I only managed a total of nineteen blog posts. I don''t knoe if I need different ideas or just more determination. I guess I better figure it out.
One last goal is to finally finish my daughter's application to join the DRA. There is one loose end to connect in the 1810-1830 time period. That will probably require land and tax records.
Surely these things will keep me busy and out of trouble. Here's to 2017!!
