Liv's Tree House

My Why... I referenced this book in my original blog post for this blog, it's definitely MY WHY, why I love this work... Building this book gave me a whole new perspective on the value of researching and learning about your ancestors. I used a program called Heritage Makers to create it. ( If you'd like me to share a copy with you just email me and let me know your Heritage Maker's account number.) Not only did I come to know and love my grandmother in a whole new ways when I made it, but I was also privileged to get to know another special ancestor...My Grandfather Willis A Chatterton, who was obviously a prominent character in her book. He had passed away when I was only 2 years old, so I really don't have any memories of him, and I can only think of one picture that I'm even in with him before he died, so there's not much to go on. I grew up hearing stories from my dad about what a crazy driver grandpa was and from my mom about how he was always the first...

As I've tried to focus my efforts when it comes to Family History work, I often find myself in a struggle. There are so many different aspects of family history to work on and I find all of them so intriguing.  After attending a couple different genealogy conferences this year I was motivated to learn a lot about the latest and greatest technologies, which let's face it, could be a full time job on it's own, there's so many amazing resources out there, and I find myself spending tons of time just trying them all out.  Then you've got just the good old fashioned genealogy research, I get so wrapped up in finding new people, researching their stories and details of their lives, and attaching sourcing to their profiles on FamilySearch.  Then there's temple work to do, I'm a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints ( LDS ), so obviously this aspect of family history is very important to me ( Why Family History is Important) , and finding the rel...

So one of my favorite genealogy resources is Dick Eastman's Online Genealogical Newsletter .  A friend introduced me to it when I become the director in Virginia, and I've followed every post since.  It's not only a great genealogical resource but a great technology resource as he generally writes several posts per day and the all focus on genealogy or technology related subjects and what the latest and greatest things happening are. Today he had a particularly interesting post that I thought I would share, which he snagged from Google's Public Policy Blog entitled " Plan Your Digital After-life with Interactive Account Manager ". Basically Google has rolled out a feature called "Inactive Account Manager", where you can select what happens to your account after X amount of inactivity.  You can have it deleted or send specific parts of your account to different email addresses, so it gives you complete control. Honestly, I think it's awesome, I...

So I came back from a week off and it was a difficult week of vacationing.  You probably think that I'm kidding, but it was super frustrating  I came back from my amazing RootsTech experience armed with all sorts of new resources for doing my family history work, and I didn't have a chance to play with them for a week and a half.  The time with family was great, and I am glad I went, but I'm really excited to be back and digging into all that I learned. The real problem is that I got back from vacation and FamilySearch decided to go ahead and release a Beta version of their new "enhanced" site while I was gone.  I've been dying to witness it ever since the Genealogy Conference I attended in early March where Dennis Brimhall introduced the new enhancements via a demo video.  So with all of these new products, my mind is on fire, and I can't decide where to focus my efforts, so I can't report in full on any of it, but I've been playing around with t...

So, I got a free 6 month subscription to My Heritage at RootsTech, and I think I may be in trouble....it has AMAZING features, I LOVE LOVE LOVE the websites, but that's never been enough to get me to join; BUT I'm finding it also has a timeline view that I've been messing around with and is just awesome for too many reasons to post; AND it has "smart match", which finds sources for your ancestors once you upload your family tree; and I don't feel like I've even scratched the surface of all that it's offering me. Thanks Jared, for giving me the free 6 months even though I didn't technically qualify since I had already created an account!!

A highlight of RootsTech for me...I was trying to learn about Story@Home at their booth when Pat of DearMyrtle , approached me.  She was clearly in a hurry and mumbled something about someone canceling on her, and quickly asked me what my booth was.  After explaining briefly what it was, she said "I need you", and led me back to her media booth explaining what was going on.  Somewhere in the chaos of it all, I was able to figure out that she had reserved a booth and she was intending to interview me about the product I was representing. Anyway, while waiting my turn I was able to chat with a man from Fold3 who had been dragged to the media booth in much the same circumstances.  It was kind of fun, and the interview ended up being kind of fun.  Check it out....

Genealogy, technology, genealogy, technology, genealogy, technology...........I don't think it gets any better than this!  A 3 day event so full of amazing resources and technology to help in your genealogy research, I can't really imagine anything better.  I'm afraid my husband thinks I'm officially crazy but I LOVE IT and I can't even help it. I learned about RootsTech about a year ago when I first got introduced to genealogy, when trying to learn everything I possibly could before teaching a class on the subject (yes, I got in over my head), I stumbled upon one of the RootsTech recorded classes, I then realized that it was an amazing resources of the latest and greatest in genealogy and technology.  So if I wanted to be at the edge, this is where I needed to start. So here I am a year later, when I found out we were moving to Utah, I signed up as quickly as I could, and this is what I got out of the deal.  Amazing keynote speakers, a Demo Hall with a nearly endle...