Liv's Tree House

I haven't joined the blog link up for a while but I really didn't want to miss this one because I LOVE the topic.  Admittedly, I could step up my game when it comes to teaching my own children genealogy skills, but as I got to thinking about the topic I realized that while I haven't ever sat down and tried to work on the family tree with them, I have taught them some valuable skills through regular play. I'm honestly pretty averse to a lot of the family history for kids ideas out there because so many require a lot of front end work just to prepare said activity before you can start doing it with your kids.  Due to my #CrazyBusy life, usually finding an activity like that just ends up NEVER HAPPENING. :)  So . . . over the years I've found some great games for teaching and learning family history alongside my kids, which I love!!  So for this post I'll share 5 of my faves: Roots & Branches : Built for ages 4 and up, Roots & Branches is an awesome way to...

As a child from a split home, I have the great blessing of having twice the grandparents, twice the love, and twice the ancestors' stories to tell. Thus Marion and Erma Bennett Winn are the subjects of my week 3 post for #52Ancestors.  As soon as I heard the topic of the week I immediately thought of my great grandparents, on my step-dad's side, affectionately known as Grandma & Grandpa Great! Marion and Erma were both raised in Idaho, born in the early 1900's, then married in 1924.  They became my Grandma and Grandpa Great in 1985 when my parents married that July.  The Winn family was fast to embrace my sister and me as their own, which is a tribute to their wonderful legacy of love and support.  Fast forward to the turn of the century when Allstate Insurance Company reached out to this now aged couple.  The company had performed what they called a nationwide search for the "longest married couple in the United States", and had found Marion and Erma to be ...

This photo of my 2nd great grandparents on my dad's side, Charles Arthur Welch & Mary Loiza Hinckley, has always been my very favorite family history photo.  I have it displayed prominently in my new home "family history" office.  There's something so perfect about their middle-aged selves, the years worth of ups and downs that they have surely experienced together, holding their heads so slightly tilted with affection, softly expressing their sincerest feelings of pure love that warms my heart.  In a time when most photos were stern or solemn, these two so naturally held a pose that shows their truest affections.  I love the soft smile on my dear grandmother's face, it tells of sincere and content happiness and love.  When I look at it I'm reminded of the times when I just breathe in the same feelings as I admire the wonderful man I was lucky enough to marry, with him everything is just whole.  I feel much the same about Charles's expression, but in c...

I'm welcoming myself back to the land of the living.  As my previous post series indicated my life is as a standard #CrazyBusy.  But drum roll.................add my 4th pregnancy to that crazy life and I kind of gave up trying to keep up with blogging, I was in survival mode.   However in the interest of a few things, 1) Joining 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks , with Amy Johnson Crow; 2) a renewed enthusiasm for all things social with Family History due to the fast approaching greatest genealogy conference,  RootsTech ; and 3) a desire to start my 21 Day Challenge again; here I am. So first to catch you up, I'm happy to report that we were able to get through all of the crazy first of the year PTA happenings without much of any hitch, I survived my 1st and 2nd trimester of pregnancy (phew), and I somehow survived my first official attempt at coordinating a Family Discovery Day.  We had a whopping 764 attendees for our little town of Payson, Utah, which was almos...