Monday, January 30, 2012

Musings on a Munday Rootstech

Two more days until I leave for Salt Lake City and Rootstech 2012. Wow, it seems like this has been a long time in coming and now that we are close I see how unprepared I am. That's ok though. Usually I'm on the other side of the equation at a conference with three inch think binders full of organizational goodness. This time I am an attendee...hear me roar!! :)

The excitement leading up to Rootstech has been at a fever pitch at times. You all know why (if you don't, it's a long story I'm not getting into). But you know what they say, there is no such thing as bad publicity. The social media and blogging world have been inundated with #Rootstech this and #Rootstech that. If my non-gena followers and friends don't know exactly what #Rootstech is by now, they certainly know it has a hashtag!

I may be tweeting from the conference (understatement). I may be posting on Facebook and Google + as well. And who knows I may even possibly get a blog post out (don't hold your breath). I have a full schedule of sessions selected and entered into my Rootstech app. Attending sessions along with the browsing through the exhibit hall, bumping, tweet-ups and networking with the over 80 Geneabloggers expected to be in attendance will keep me busy. At some point I may even make it over to the Family History Library and spend some time on the book floor.

I am looking forward to meeting new people, catching up with others and hanging with my roomie Caroline from For Your Family Story. If you will be attending (is ANYONE else from Missouri going?)be sure to look me up!

Sunday, January 29, 2012

Monday, January 23, 2012

Thursday, January 19, 2012

Surnames I Seek

I have had a surnames page on this blog since shortly after I created it. Originally I added few of my direct line names without any detail. Little by little I added a few more bits of information not knowing how useful it would be to my blog or to my blog visitors.

Recently while viewing my stats I realized something pretty interesting. When selecting to view my stats for "All Time", the Surnames I Seek page has the largest number of page views by a significant amount. So my creative writing and witty repartee hasn't been the most interesting piece to this blog? Apparently not.

Realizing that I am looking at a missed opportunity, I will now begin to add more names and details to this page. I shouldn't have assumed visitors would scroll through all my blog posts looking for a common surname. I can't rely on my labels to be a direct link to the information visitors may be searching for.

This time next year it will be interesting to see if I have moved from a missed opportunity to a window of opportunity.

Monday, January 16, 2012

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Blogger Spotlight for 2012

Blogging serves different purposes for different people. Some blog because they enjoy writing and some blog to share their families stories. Others blog to share tips and provide a level of education to their readers. Regardless of the reason behind the generation of the blog you can't deny that blogging has become much more mainstream and bloggers are achieving a new level of respect. There are some phenomenal bloggers out there, so many in fact that my Google Reader is always at 500+ unread!

In order to spotlight some of these great blogs the Genealogy and History Links Library site will be announcing a Blogger of the Month during 2012. I have been a contributor to GHLL for the past 10 years and am responsible for the Web Site of The Week feature. As I came to rely on blogs in addition to websites in my genealogy research I thought it would be a good idea to shine the light on them as well. Additionally, some of these bloggers will be guest posting for the newsletter Branching Out.

Of course since this was my idea...I get to be the first Blogger of the Month!! :) It's only fair right? While I don't claim to be in the same caliber as the bloggers that will follow me, I do enjoy their blogs and appreciate the research tips and expertise they bring to the table. I reached out to a group of my favorites, asking if they would like to participate. Being the wonderful group of people they are, I had a great positive response.

While you take some time to check out the featured bloggers please also browse the GHLL site to see vast array of information that is available.

Friday, January 6, 2012

What If Henry Vogt Was Your Man

I began watching the Genealogy How-To Videos on NARA's YouTube channel after several geneabloggers pointed them out this week.  While watching the video on immigration records the presenter discussed a record for Henry Vogt. This got me wondering, what would I do if Henry Vogt was my man? What if Henry was my Great Great Grandfather I had been tirelessly searching for over the past five years? Of course I would be doing the happy dance! But who has that happened to? Surely it's happened to someone? Listen later in the video and she will mention that somebody did recognize another individual they were discussing at a NARA workshop. THAT would be exciting!




Thursday, January 5, 2012

Finding Your Roots

The following article is from Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter and is copyright by Richard W. Eastman. It is re-published here with the permission of the author. Information about the newsletter is available at http://www.eogn.com.  Originally published on January 4, 2012.



Sunday, January 1, 2012

Happy New Year 2012



Wishing all my followers the happiest and healthiest of New Years!

While you may have been expecting a New Year's graphic, I have chosen not to create one. Instead I will let my new blog header be my graphic. New year, new look!

Happy New Year!

Jenna