Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Focusing my efforts in 2014

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My strategy for focusing my genealogy efforts in 2014In December every year, I take some time to set some goals. I set them for my organizing business and for my personal life. This will be the second year I’ve set goals for my genealogy research. (If you want, you can read the goals I set last year.)

In thinking about my genealogy goals for 2014, I realized that I really want to be more focused and organized in going about my research. I still struggle with not knowing what to work on in any given session. And that lack of focus makes it hard for me to actually get started.

I just hit upon an idea that I think I’ll try. I’m going to assign a family line to each quarter of the year. In this structure (which I just thought of, so it’s still evolving in my head), I won’t be limited to working on that line necessarily, but if I don’t have something else specific I want to do, I will work on the family line assigned to that quarter.

I’ve decided that the schedule will be as follows:

  • 1st quarter: Adams (my father’s father’s line)
  • 2nd quarter: Brown (my mother’s father’s line)
  • 3rd quarter: Rasco (my father’s mother’s line)
  • 4th quarter: Jeffries (my mother’s mother’s line)

At the start of each quarter, I’ll take stock of where my research lies. I’ll use my progress tracker to see what census, vital and military records I’ve already located.

During each quarter, I’ll try to do the following for each of the lines:

  • Fill in the gaps on my progress tracker
  • Make sure my surname files for that line are organized on my hard drive
  • Ensure that everything in my paper files for that line is also organized on my hard drive
  • Fill in collateral relatives on my family tree in Reunion
  • Search for sources for unsourced data provided to me by cousins
  • Go up at least one generation in verified information
  • Attach photos to my family tree in Reunion

What I like about this idea is that it should keep me more focused. And help me feel less overwhelmed. It should get me past the “what should I work on today?” question that can be such a barrier. And, perhaps best of all, it gives me some specific goals and a deadline–the end of the quarter. (I love a deadline!)

Tiny organizing projects

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Time to empty that To File file!For many people, this is a five-day weekend. A glorious expanse of time that might include some family history research. While doing your research is certainly important, I encourage you this weekend to also spend a little time organizing it.

I’m not suggesting that you pull everything out and try to organize it all. If you do that, you risk not finishing and ending up with a bigger mess than when you started.

Rather, I’m suggesting you take a look at your genealogy space and/or records and visualize some little projects. Do you have a group of photos you can organize? Some filing you can do? Some order to create on your hard drive? Maybe you need to create a research plan or put together a comprehensive to-do list.

My point here is that when it comes to organizing your family history, you probably have a whole series of tiny organizing projects you can do a little at a time. If you spend 30 minutes each day this weekend (and perhaps every weekend), you could get a surprisingly large amount of organizing done.

Take a look around and spot a small project. Write it down and look for another. Do this a few times and you have a great (hopefully not overwhelming) organizing task list.

I’ll be doing the same this weekend. Happy organizing!

Dealing with a box of family photos

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trying to create order from a jumbled box of family photosUntil recently my mother had a box of old family photos in her closet that we would enjoy going through with her when I visited. As I’ve become more involved with family history research and with learning about proper preservation techniques, I realized that I really wanted to get the photos to my home and deal with them properly.

So when I was there a couple of weeks ago, I mailed them to myself. They arrived last week. That’s a photo of the box and its jumbled contents.

I don’t know about you, but when I see a box like that and think about creating order out of it, I get a little overwhelmed. But, luckily, something else came in the mail the next day. It was the Family Archivist Survival Kit, sold by Sally Jacobs, The Practical Archivist. Part of the kit is her Loose Photos Kit (I certainly have loose photos!). That includes archival-quality storage boxes and envelopes as well as instruction.

My intention is to buy the ScanSnap SV600 scanner and scan these babies. But first, I have to create some order and figure out what I have.

Knowing that I have a place to put photos after I sort them (and after I scan them) gives me peace of mind.

Step One is going to be to read the copious information provided in the kits. Step Two (unless I learn otherwise) is going to be to sort into families. And Step Three will be to sort by individual. Maybe it’s the professional organizer in me, but I know I’ll feel better once the photos are sorted and I see what I have and also have segregated the photos that need identification–of which there will be many.

Many aspects of family history research make me feel overwhelmed. And here’s another case. But having resources and supplies available to me is hugely helpful, and probably the reason I was able to actually take the box from my mother. (She’s been offering it for years.)

I’ll write here about the progress and any surprises that are thrown my way!

Overwhelmed by resources

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shopfamilytreeWhen I decided to get serious about genealogy a year or two ago, I jumped at many opportunities there are to learn. I signed up for lots of free newsletters, as well as paid webinars and classes, books, and other resources. I joined Ancestry, Fold 3, Mocavo, and Genealogy Bank. And I spent a good deal of money at Shop Family Tree. There are no shortage of ways for me to research my ancestors.

Unfortunately, I’m not working on genealogy full-time. I have an organizing business to run, as well as the demands of day-to-day life. I want to both do the research and improve my researching skills. So some of these learning opportunities are lying fallow at the moment.

And here’s where the overwhelm kicks in: I know there are a lot of purchased items spread out over my hard drive. Some are in my files. Others on my bookshelves. I don’t know what I have. If I do know, I’m not exactly sure where to find it.

It’s time to do something about that. Here’s where my resources are scattered:

Hard drive: I’ve done a good job of organizing my hard drive when it comes to research documents (i.e. documentation about my ancestors). But it’s time to put a laser focus on my resources. I’m going to give some thought as to how to organize the stuff on my hard drive. I’m thinking of subfolders in my Genealogy folder, based on subject. But I know also need a way to track what I’ve actually read/viewed and what I haven’t. Perhaps a spreadsheet. But right now I think I might use Springpad, which I’ve been experimenting with of late. Of course, Evernote could be another option.

Book shelves and file cabinet: I have some books and some CD-ROMs and some printed PDFs scattered about. I need to locate them, catalog them, and store them all in one place, where I can easily retrieve them.

Organizing all these resources is a great first step. But the next step is to actually read the stuff, learn from it and apply what I’ve learned! When I read something particularly useful, I’ll be sure to share it here.