My November 30 x 30 challenge ended yesterday. (It went from November 2 to December 1.) During that time, I pledged to work at least 30 minutes per day for 30 days.

I ended up missing three days. My brother has been visiting from Australia since November 21 and his visit disrupted my routine enough that I forgot to do research a couple of times. (But I researched more than 30 minutes a number of those days, so I got my time in.) I learned earlier this year that the best time for me to work on genealogy is first thing in the morning. That strategy allowed me to do research while my brother slept in the morning.

With the exception of a couple of days, November’s work was all about the Civil War pension file of my great great grandfather, George W. Adams. I have now transcribed 26 of the 138 documents in the file, a drop in the bucket. But this exercise has confirmed for me that slow and steady wins the race. I plan to continue with my daily efforts in hopes that I can finish transcribing and abstracting the file before too much time has passed.

The file contains some details about my great great grandfather’s second wife and one day that sent me galloping off in search of more information about her. But I reminded myself of my moratorium on bringing in new information and the next day I was back to the task at hand.

I can imagine that some people might find this approach boring, but I’m finding it easy and reassuring to know what I’m going to be working on each day and to make progress each and every day.

Next week I travel to Washington state to visit my family so it remains to be seen whether I’ll be able to keep up my daily effort. But I still have the advantage of being an early riser, so I remain hopeful.

If you participated in the challenge, how did you do?

It’s been ten months since I implemented a 30 x 30 challenge, in which I challenged myself to do genealogy research for 30 minutes a day for 30 days. I started this new challenge on Wednesday, so my 30 days will go from November 2 to December 1.

I did this in August 2015 with great results. My attempt to do another one in January 2016 was ill-fated, thanks to the potent combination of a new puppy and a typically busy January for my organizing business.

For many people November is a busy time, what with Thanksgiving and the December holidays coming up. That’s not really the case for me; I don’t have to do any work for Thanksgiving and my Christmas responsibilities are limited to holiday cards. I will be enjoying a visit from my brother (who lives in Australia) during this time, but he won’t prevent me from doing genealogy research.

Thanks to my moratorium on bringing in new information, I’m newly focused on processing the rather complicated pension file of my great great grandfather, George Washington Adams (1845-1938), who fought with the 35th Regiment, Kentucky Volunteer Infantry in the Civil War. While living in the U.S. National Home for Volunteer Disabled Soldiers in Danville, Illinois, in the 1920s, he was turned in for not being as disabled as he said he was on his pension application. Investigations  and appeals ensued (he even got his senator involved). That made for a lot of documents to process–more than 150 pages worth! But it’s a true treasure trove of information and paints quite a picture of my ancestor.

I don’t think I’ll have a problem putting in 30 minutes (or more) a day, if life stays on an even keel.

Would anyone like to join me on a 30 x 30 challenge?

ETA: Commenter Maria asked for a photo of my puppy Bix, who just turned one. Here’s a favorite: celebrating victory after removing a squeaker from a toy. He loves destroying toys!