Best Reason to Throw a Party The best excuse to clean your house , I once read, is to ready it for a party . While cleaning house, I thought, is the same true about "writing it up"? Writing the stories of our ancestors and relatives is the culmination of our work. When we know that our place is welcoming to guests, we feel free to celebrate; telling stories of the past unlocks the lives of our families to all who hear them. Writing the stories is t he best excuse to research. Write while researching so that that your thoughts have somewhere to go‒directly into the notes, before they evaporate. Writing soothes the itch in the brain instead of sending us down rabbit holes. Now is a great time to get started writing, in preparation for Family History Month in October . Courtesy of the National Genealogical Society Writing tests our research and thinking It is while writing that holes in the story are exposed, inconsistencies glare, and leaps of logic fall flat. If our analysis...

New Mexico Wildfire- -Silver City Sun-News Devon Noel Lee is back! The Family History Fanatics team had to flee their home to escape the terrible forest fires in New Mexico, and have recently been able to resume their informative, useful videos. Devon's first loves in genealogy are first, research, and then writing about family.  Write a Timeline Recently I watched one of her short writing videos called " Write a Family History Story in Chronological Order | FIRST DRAFT ONLY " which seems so logical! Notice the "first draft only" part of the title. Writing out a timeline can sort your thoughts and yield insights about what happened in the family, such as births happening during travel, deaths of family members close together, when and where the land purchases took place, all of which might otherwise not be noticed. You may notice holes in your research as you write, which will pause the writing while you chase down those records and complete finding context and...

Recently a short YouTube Family History Fanatics video about Puzzilla popped up which seemed interesting, so I searched a bit and found  Use Puzzilla.org to Find Genealogy Research Opportunities on FamilySearch.org  and the website Puzzilla.org itself. What I like about it is that it can be used for analysis and it is beautiful . It's sometimes difficult to show our research in a way that interests family members. Puzzilla is attractive and interactive as well as useful.  There is a paid version which is available for use at some Family History Centers. Next Research Workshop, I plan to check it out and see how much more there is! I played with both the ancestor and descendants function. First, the ancestors of my grandson Oscar: Grandson Oscar's ancestors: some work to do! Son of our immigrant from the Alsace, Casper Baysinger's descendants: Beautiful, don't you think? Gorgeous! but it's not so pretty when there are few descendants, or the re...