Well at the end of the first week of NFHM 2016 I am already a little weary. Events are still being added to the National Family History Month web calendar and entries for the prize giveaway are arriving daily. Remember to read the terms and conditions on the Sponsors page as they include how to enter the giveaway.
Yesterday I attended the Family Discovery day at the Forest Glen Family History Centre which is very new and a great venue to host a day of genealogy talks. There were two streams of talks throughout the day except for my session which made for a huge audience. I think there were about 120 attendees. My talks was Demolishing Brick Walls and this was the same talk I gave in Perth last weekend. You can see it on the Resources page of my website, scroll down to Presentations. I received some great feedback and lots of people went home determined to break down their brick walls.
The first session I went to was a demonstration on how to use FamilySearch's family tree program and attaching photos, stories and documents. I always like to see how other people organise their family history, usually experiencing some jealousy. People who have only started in 'computer times' mostly have all their research contained within their program whereas those of us who have been doing it for some decades, it seems to be a mix of paper and computer. I just need to stop doing everything else I do and even then, I'm not sure I'd have enough time.
There was a soup and fruit lunch after my talk but I was caught up with people wanting to ask me questions for the whole of the lunch break. A very nice person brought me a cup of soup and I managed to find a few pieces of orange still on the fruit plate. Why don't people like fruit with skin? I love oranges and they were so sweet. Even while I was having my soup and fruit there were still people asking me questions or talking to me. It's nice to be popular.
Somewhat fortified I caught the end of the How to use Ancestry better which was a video with Christa Cowan explaining various tips. I'm obviously not making the most of Ancestry, especially if I don't find what I'm looking for first up. Note to self - explore the Advanced search in more detail and don't forget to use those wildcards. Ironic really because I mentioned both those things in my Demolishing Brick Walls talk!
The last session I went to was a talk by Mike England on the different calendars and how these could impact on your research if you get back to the 18th century. While I was aware of the different calendars, Mike's examples made me much more conscious of how it could be very different within the UK due to the Protestants and the Catholics having different calendars. I first met Mike in Kingaroy some 30 odd years ago so good to see him again.
That's one of the nice things about attending genealogy events, there is usually someone you know and I met up with quite a few people from the Sunshine Coast, Hervey Bay, Maryborough and Kingaroy. Wonderful to see that people did travel for this event.
There's no rest for the wicked (not that the voluntary national coordinator of NFHM is wicked) but I'm off to give two talks at Caloundra Library this week before flying off to Auckland, New Zealand for their family history expo with Dick Eastman and others on the program. I'm giving six talks over there before heading home. There will be a full report on the expo when I get back so stay tuned.
It's not all talking for NFHM, I have also agreed to take the Alex's NFHM blog challenge which is an online event. Week 1 was on the Census and my contribution was simply called Census Night. I wrote about my discovery in the 1901 Irish census. The Australian History Bloggers now have a Facebook Fan page and you can read more NFHM blogs there and Alex will be bringing all the challenge blogs together at the end.
It's another busy week coming up and then there will be the last two weeks of NFHM which are usually busy too, not just with talks but also managing the prizes giveaway. I hope that people don't leave it all too the end as that just makes it harder for me. The prize draw is after my final NFHM talk at Noosaville library on 31 August and I expect to be seriously exhausted by then. So my treat will be a nice night at one of my favourite spots (Mooloolaba) going to one of my favourite restaurants and simply chilling out with fine food and wine.
Continue to enjoy NFHM 2016 and my 31 Activities for Researchers is there for anyone stuck for ideas. Until next time, happy searching.
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| Forest Glen Family History Centre |
There was a soup and fruit lunch after my talk but I was caught up with people wanting to ask me questions for the whole of the lunch break. A very nice person brought me a cup of soup and I managed to find a few pieces of orange still on the fruit plate. Why don't people like fruit with skin? I love oranges and they were so sweet. Even while I was having my soup and fruit there were still people asking me questions or talking to me. It's nice to be popular.
Somewhat fortified I caught the end of the How to use Ancestry better which was a video with Christa Cowan explaining various tips. I'm obviously not making the most of Ancestry, especially if I don't find what I'm looking for first up. Note to self - explore the Advanced search in more detail and don't forget to use those wildcards. Ironic really because I mentioned both those things in my Demolishing Brick Walls talk!
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| One of the lecture areas |
That's one of the nice things about attending genealogy events, there is usually someone you know and I met up with quite a few people from the Sunshine Coast, Hervey Bay, Maryborough and Kingaroy. Wonderful to see that people did travel for this event.
There's no rest for the wicked (not that the voluntary national coordinator of NFHM is wicked) but I'm off to give two talks at Caloundra Library this week before flying off to Auckland, New Zealand for their family history expo with Dick Eastman and others on the program. I'm giving six talks over there before heading home. There will be a full report on the expo when I get back so stay tuned.
It's not all talking for NFHM, I have also agreed to take the Alex's NFHM blog challenge which is an online event. Week 1 was on the Census and my contribution was simply called Census Night. I wrote about my discovery in the 1901 Irish census. The Australian History Bloggers now have a Facebook Fan page and you can read more NFHM blogs there and Alex will be bringing all the challenge blogs together at the end.
It's another busy week coming up and then there will be the last two weeks of NFHM which are usually busy too, not just with talks but also managing the prizes giveaway. I hope that people don't leave it all too the end as that just makes it harder for me. The prize draw is after my final NFHM talk at Noosaville library on 31 August and I expect to be seriously exhausted by then. So my treat will be a nice night at one of my favourite spots (Mooloolaba) going to one of my favourite restaurants and simply chilling out with fine food and wine.
Continue to enjoy NFHM 2016 and my 31 Activities for Researchers is there for anyone stuck for ideas. Until next time, happy searching.
Busy times ahead, Shauna. You'll need that night out at the end of all this.
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