Genealogy notes 27 Jul - 3 Aug 2013 National Family History Month

I live a normally busy if not hectic lifestyle but this last week has completely tuckered me out! It's only the third day of National Family History Month and I'm exhausted but it's a fantastic feeling. I've put up so many new events on the NFHM web calendar although we still don't have anything happening in the Northern Territory yet. Hopefully that might change as the month progresses.

I was also busy finalising everything for the launch which was on Thursday in Brisbane. It was a fantastic day - we travelled to Brisbane early so that we could collect Kerrie Gray, President of the Australasian Federation of Family History Organisations (AFFHO) from the airport on our way through to the National Archives of Australia, Brisbane Office for the launch. I've done a blog post on the various speakers and also gave an account of the changes to NFHM 2013. The winners of the 2013 Nick Vine Hall awards are also included and don't miss all the news from National Archives of Australia. You can read about the launch and speaker talks here. NFHM is quite different from previous years and I think that we have more events than ever before but I haven't had time to count them.

The last few days have seen me give three radio interviews about NFHM - one with Christy-Lee Macqueen, Mornings Presenter with ABC North West, one with Ed Cowlishaw on Riverland Today with ABC Riverland and Mallee and one with Natasha Mitchell on the program Life Matters on ABC National. That was an interesting one hour session titled Framed: the family portrait. There is something a bit nerve wracking about doing live to air interviews - I always have the fear that the questions will be tricky or that I will have a complete mind freeze. But they all went well and I was amazed at how many people actually heard the shows, especially the Life Matters session. I'm not a big radio person myself but others obviously are.

I'm now about to pack for my trip down south. First stop tomorrow is Melbourne where I will be attending Family History Feast at the State Library of Victoria. This will be a bit of a trip down memory lane as it is the 10th anniversary since Anne Burrows (SLV), Anne Piggott (NAA) and myself (then PROV) started what has become a must attend event in NFHM. This year is another full house which is fantastic and myself and the two Annes will celebrate over dinner that night. Really looking forward to catching up with them.

From Melbourne I'm heading up to Canberra (another one of my old homes) to be the NFHM speaker at the August meeting of the Heraldry and Genealogy Society of Canberra (HAGSOC). I'm having dinner with a few of my old HAGSOC friends before the talk so I will have to stick to one glass of wine with dinner or there won't be a talk! On Wednesday I'm catching up with an old colleague from NAA and on Thursday it's a meeting of the NAA's advisory committee for the centenary of WW1 which should be interesting. I love hearing about all the projects on the go for next year.

Somehow I will try and blog these events while I'm on the road and I know I did say that I would be doing blog posts on my 31 activities for researchers and 31 activities for genealogy/family history societies during NFHM but there may be a bit of a delay. Once I'm back on Bribie Island I'll be able to catch up again.

It's been great to see all my social media friends promoting NFHM and I really think that by the end of August everyone will know what genealogy and family history is all about. Thanks everyone. I'm also learning new skills and managed to put up some photos of the launch on the NFHM Facebook page and the number of Likes has gone up to 434 which is still a long way short of the 1000 Likes I would like before the end of August. The NFHM sponsors have all been fantastic in helping to promote the month too.

Have I done any of my own genealogy in the last week? Not a lot but one thing that was interesting is that I visited the genEbooks website (one of the NFHM sponsors) and noticed that they have a free ebook each month. So I registered which is a simple process, selected the free ebook and proceeded to check out and within a minute or so I had received the ebook via email. I also did a survey for the Unlock the Past genealogy cruises and by leaving my name I received a 50% discount on an ebook before 31 August. So when I come back I will take up that offer but sadly it will probably just go into my virtual pile of ebooks to read. The good thing is that they don't gather dust like the pile of real books I have to read!

Breaking news from AFFHO! Our Australasian Really Useful Information Leaflet is now available. This is a free, 20 page initiative of the UK based Federation of Family History Societies in association with Australasian Federation of Family History Organisations and the Society of  Australian Genealogists.

Well I have to go and finish packing and this afternoon I've been invited to a Tupperware party and I don't think I've been to one of those in over 20 years if not longer.It's a gorgeous day here on Bribie Island and I also have to water all my new herbs, flowers and other plants as they are predicting even warmer, dry days while I'm away. I'm trying not to think of those much cooler temperatures in Melbourne and Canberra!

Enjoy the next week of NFHM and remember to keep checking the web calendar as events might still be added as the month progresses! Happy researching.

Genealogy notes 20-26 July 2013 National Family History Month talks & travels

It is hard to believe that National Family History Month (NFHM) is now only a week away but obviously I'm not the only one who leaves things to the last minute. I have been kept super busy all week adding new events to every state except unfortunately the Northern Territory. I haven't found anyone up there doing anything yet. Check out the web calendar on the NFHM website for events near you.

As well as that, I have finalised my 31 activities for researchers and 31 activities for genealogy/family history societies for NFHM and the details and lists are on my the Resources page of my website. The lists are a prompt for people to undertake a range of family history related activities throughout August to further their own research and knowledge. I will also be blogging about each activity (when I get the time) to give you further ideas as well, not to mention progress my own family research. You can do as few or as many activities as you want. I would love to see others blogging about any or all of the activities over the month. Don't forget to let me know how you go.

Last night I was Inside History Magazine's guest on their regular Thursday night Q&A on their Facebook page and I'm very grateful for the opportunity to promote National Family History Month. I was kept busy over the hour answering various questions about the month and the type of events that are being held. Inside History Magazine is one of NFHM's key sponsors and their sponsorship is appreciated.

As it is now just over a week till I head south, I've also been busy working on my talk for HAGSOC in Canberra.I'm totally reworking my Google Tools talk - I started out just changing a few slides and then went on to the major revamp. There are just so many things I could focus on and keeping to within the time frame is always a challenge. I'm also doing the same for my talk It's Not All Online which is at the Bribie Island Library on 30 August.

I've been doing a massive tidy up and toss out/give away in the study again. A lot of the material is out of date or superseded by changes in technology and online access but I do find it hard to part with old genealogy magazines. The temptation is to start rereading the old UK genealogy magazines but at least now there are all organised again by title and date instead of still inside the removal boxes. Of course it also means that I end up with more things on my to do list as I follow up hints in the magazines.

On the domestic front I've managed another couple of swims as the water temperature is hovering around 22 degrees and it has been warm and sunny and it really is hard to believe it is the middle of winter. The choko vine from next door continues to fruit almost overnight and we simply can't eat or give away that many chokoes. So I came up with the brilliant idea of doing choko pickles which is another first for me. Not something high on my bucket list but the desire to make my own pickles has always been there. Surprisingly they are absolutely delicious and the neighbours liked them so much, they have put in an order for my mango chutney when the mangoes come back into season! I wonder if any of my female ancestors were into doing pickles and chutneys? It must come from somewhere.

Today is a bit wet and drizzly so we are off to the pictures to see the Lone Ranger. I used to love the Lone Ranger and Tonto as a kid so it will be interesting to see what they've done with the story line. Next time I write NFHM will be upon us. Happy days!

Genealogy notes 12-19 July 2013 seminars, cruises & #NFHM13

This past week has been a bit more like my life of old - where I did genealogy seven days a week! The trip out to Chinchilla was good and we tend to travel off the main highways to see more of the real countryside. So we usually stop at Yowie Park in Kilcoy for lunch and to watch the amazing bird life around the lake. For those not familiar with a yowie, check out Wikipedia entry for yowie.

The Coff & Co bakery opposite Yowie Park has some of the best pies we've ever eaten. In the last year we have probably stopped there at least four times and have never been disappointed. Next stop was Chinchilla where we were booked into the very convenient Downtown Motor Inn which was across the road from the RSL which was the venue for the seminar.

Sue Reid, former President of Queensland Family History Society presented two talks on using online newspapers and I had heard both of these earlier in the year at a QFHS seminar. But it's amazing how much more you take in on hearing something a second time. Sue concentrated on the big four, Trove, Papers Past, the London Gazette (with links to the Edinburgh Gazette and Belfast Gazette too) and the London Times via the National Library of Australia's e-resources.She had a handout which saved some mad scribbling down of URLs and I was again reminded that I really should look for my American and Canadian families in the many newspapers Sue included in her talk.

My two talks were on Trove and other NLA treasures and Google for Genealogy and as usual I put the slides up on my website Resources page, scroll down to Presentations. By the end of the day there was information overload but I think they will all be spending more time on their computers in the coming weeks. One brave person is also following me on Twitter. Both Sue and I had a range of Unlock the Past books for attendees to check out and I spent a few frantic moments signing my books!

The next day we left Chinchilla and went out to Miles which is where Max's mother and father met during WW2. She was the daughter of the Windsor Hotel licensee and he was the handsome soldier working in the area. If he hadn't gone in for a beer they might never have met and Max would not be here. It always makes me think to consider how random it was for some of our ancestors to actually meet up. As luck would have it the Windsor Hotel has recently changed hands and it was not open. However, an enquiry at the bottle shop soon saw us permitted inside to have a look at the downstairs rooms and the old photos on the wall. We also have some old photos of the family's time in Miles but it was good to walk around the streets and get a feel of what life was like back then. We also spent quite a few hours at the Miles Historical Village which has some amazing buildings and collections. We even found Max's Uncle Len's police uniforms and record of his career there!

We hadn't been able to contact Max's cousin in Kingaroy so we ended up spending the night in Esk and had a great dinner at Sticky Fingers (fantastic name for a restaurant). The next morning we explored the various antique shops in the main street and I managed to pick up some quirky things for the house. From there we went to Wivenhoe Dam and then on to Somerset Dam before arriving back at Yowie Park in Kilcoy for afternoon tea. The local tourist info centre was having a plant sale and I managed to pick up a few more bromeliads for our rainforest out the back.

Then it was home to Bribie Island as the next day we were having a luncheon cruise on the Lady Brisbane which is recreating the trips of the Koopa to Bribie in the pre bridge days. As Max's family used to come over on the Koopa we again felt like we were walking in our ancestors footsteps. It was fascinating to see the bottom end of Bribie from out in Moreton Bay - as a sand island it is very flat but it almost disappears off the horizon the further out you go. It was also good to see Brisbane's skyscrapers in the distance too. It's a small world on Bribie and we knew a few people on board so we all went for coffee after the cruise.

Most of my time at home has been spent on National Family History Month adding events to the website, liaising with sponsors and making sure the launch is progressing. It seemed ages away a little while ago but is now only 12 days away. There are some great events across Australia so I hope everyone can get to at least one event. I'm also going to be putting up my 31 activities for researchers and 31 activities for societies next week so everyone will have something to do in August.

This morning I went to my local newsagent just to see what genealogy magazines they have in store and I was pleased to see that they had Australian Family Tree Connections and Inside History Magazine - both active sponsors of NFHM. There were also some UK magazines as well and I couldn't help myself, I bought the May issue of Family Tree Magazine. After I got home I made a cup of coffee and settled down to have a good read and who is looking up at me from the page? None other than my friend Jill Ball and Thomas Macentee in a photo taken at Rootstech 2013. How's that for serendipity! I'm looking forward to meeting Thomas on the 4th Unlock the Past genealogy cruise next February and of course Jill is another one of the speakers on the cruise. In fact there are going to be quite a few Geneabloggers on that cruise. Can't wait for that.

I've received some more book royalties from the sale of my books published by Unlock the Past and I've received an exciting publishing offer which I'm still considering. The last part of my series on Irish Loved Ones Downunder was published in the July issue of Irish Lives Remembered - that 12 months went very quick. I suspect I won't get too much personal genealogy done in the next few weeks as NFHM will take up most of my time. Plus I have genealogy trips to Melbourne and Canberra coming up too but more about that next time. Happy searching.