Researching Your Ancestors

Have you done research to know who your ancestors are? There are many ways to research your ancestors. First of all talk with family members. See if parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and other relatives can give you information on your ancestors. When I moved twenty years ago to a small town over 500 miles away from where I grew up, I discovered that I have distant cousins here. Those cousins have shared stories and photos of our common ancestors with me and I have shared what I have with them.
Next go through family records and find what information you can there. Birth certificates, death certificates, marriage licenses, deeds and other documents will have some information that may help you learn more about your ancestors. Letters and cards may also give information. Even a calendar may have events and appointments written on.
Next check family photos. Some one may have written information on the back of photos. Names are commonly written on photos, and dates and locations may also be written. You may also get information like how many children there were in a family by counting the number of children in a family group photo. You may also see what a home was like or where the family traveled to in the photos.
Next search online. A good website for researching your ancestors is www.familysearch.org. Here you can put in a family name and you may find a lot of research has already been done on some members of your family. You may also choose to subscribe to a website where you can access more records to search for your ancestors. You can put the name of a person in and search the web for that name. I found a website on one of my ancestors that way.
After finding information on your family members, you may want to make a pedigree chart or a family group sheet to preserve that information and display it in your home or in a scrapbook.

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Inspiring Quotes

When you read an inspiring quote do you think of how it applies in your life? Maybe you heard a quote in a speech or read it in a book, and it has given you a new insight. Recording those inspiring quotes in your life story or making a scrapbook page using that quote is a good way to share the insight you received. I made a scrapbook page with an acrostic poem using the word "family" and a photo of my parents. Following is the poem.

F ather
A nd
M other
I
L ove
Y ou.

There are other sayings I really like. I could use those throughout a scrapbook to show what quotes have influenced my life. Think of those quotes that mean a lot to you and how they could enhance your life story.

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Easter

Easter

What do you do to celebrate Easter? What were some of the things you did as a child at Easter time? Traditions change and circumstances change, so holiday celebrations change also. When I was young we colored Easter eggs, and then we took them up the hill behind our house and rolled them down the hill. When my dad remarried, my stepmother liked to go on a picnic for Easter. With my children we hid the eggs and hunted for them. Add your Easter celebrations to your story.

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