December 2024 – GenealogyAtHeart.com

12 Genealogy Lessons I Learned in 2024

Wow! Last blog of 2024 and what a year it’s been.

The best thing about genealogy is that you are constantly learning and growing. No one can know about every record set, historical period, or nuances of language over the years. Today I’m reflecting on some of the A-Ha moments I had this year:

AI has been the biggest game changer in my life. I use ChatGPT almost daily now and occasionally with Claude and others. It saves time and helps me think outside the box to solve problems.
Realizing that the Viking Pagans held on to their symbolism after converting to Roman Catholicism was amazing to me. Who would have thought the church would have allowed it? Even more surprising is that the pagan baptismal fonts are still used today by the Lutherans.
I also didn’t know that grapes don’t grow in Sweden so the Vikings traveled in the summer to the Mediterranean to buy wine. My family had vineyards there so maybe they bought Zinfadel from them. Always been a small world, right?!
Had no idea when the potato famine hit Ireland it also affected crops in Europe, hence many from the French German Palatine area migrated to the U.S. at that time.
While researching Ohio River pirates for an upcoming presentation, I learned that one of the most notorious, James Mason, got a Spanish passport because President Benjamin Harrison had given him a recommendation. Dear Ben’s sister had married the honorable brother of James Mason. Just goes to show you how different siblings can be even back in the day.
Did you know that identity theft occurred in the 1890s? It did and I’m still working on solving that one!
My husband is constantly kidding me about being a princess (which I’m not) because I’ve now seen the family castles in Croatia, Germany, and Great Britain. People are so worried about being safe today but it’s no different than in the past– we just don’t have a moat around our houses anymore.
I didn’t realize that there were jobs for lawyers regarding keeping a person’s coat of arms protected. Who would have thought that would still be needed today?!
Every time I look at my cats I just can’t get over their ethnicity and I wonder which ancestor in my husband and my past was adopted by my cat’s ancestors. Yeah, it’s weird, I know!
A good reminder that there is someone out there who knows the answer to whatever question you might ask and you just have to be persistent and patient to get the answer. I finally found a knowledgeable person who knew how to read old German script AND understood the cultural heritage. I needed to find someone who had both these skills to understand one little ole word in a 1834 newspaper article written in German in Cincinnati, Ohio. He learned that the custom had been brought over to the US which was also news to him. Collaborating with others helps us get the info we need and in turn, we help them gain insights.
Loved the easy peesy way to do genealogy in French villages – take a walk and look above the doors of the houses. Back then they engraved the date the house was built and who the owners were. I was able to quickly find my ancestral homes.
I am reminded almost weekly of how much our life has changed since the pandemic. Zoom seems to have been around forever but I didn’t use it before 2019. Makes me wonder what’s next on the horizon.

That’s one new thought for each month of 2024. Can’t wait to discover more new and exciting ideas next year.

As usual, I’ll be taking off next week and will be back in January with my top ten blog list from 2024. Have a wonderful holiday and I’ll blog with you soon!

Photo Memories

I bet with the approaching holidays you and your loved ones will be taking loads of pictures! Back in the day, it was exciting to get the film developed. Sort of like reliving the same experience over. Now, I take so many photos that I use my cell camera for mundane tasks. What is the name of that weed or is it a native flower? Snap it and check and app. Love that item in a store but aren’t sure the price is right. Click the pic and then look for it elsewhere.

Although these new uses for a camera are wonderful, they aren’t if we are treating the important photos we take carelessly. Do you ever save your phone photos? If so, where?

Here’s what I’ve been doing since Google Photo lost some of my pictures several years ago. I now have my photos saved to a different Cloud. That way, I can remove them from my phone. Why do I do that? Because I’ve had phone accidents where I couldn’t retrieve data, and I don’t want my precious photo memories gone forever.

When my kids were young, I was a scrapbooker and I saved the best of the best by including them with a story of the event. It took a lot of time, but it was fun. I’m not sure it was worth it, though, as I’ve passed them on to my adult kids who have no space for them. One is in boxes in an attic and the other complained about having to move them twice this year while doing renovations. Those, too, ended up in the attic for a while. Sigh.

During the pandemic one of my kids gave me a photo album that can only hold one picture on each page. The idea was to only save a small amount of the very best photos from my overseas travels. I was pining to travel, and this was a way to get me to relive what I had done and plan for what was to come. And oh boy, did travel come! In the past year and a half, I’ve visited Germany twice, Croatia, Slovenia, Macedonia, Sweden, Denmark, Ireland, England, Scotland, Wales, France, and Canada.

The weather outside is frightfully cold so I’ve ordered two more albums and will spend my time indoors reliving those memories by printing from my printer using photo paper and affixing those special pics into the book. They really are genealogical treasures as on my travels I always make time for family research.

The beauty of these albums is that they don’t take up much space and I’ll be passing on to future generations my findings as I write a sentence or two of what the location is about. Next week I’ll be writing about my most memorable learning experiences this year. It will be my last post of the year.

Cooking Up Memories

Do you get out your favorite family recipes during this time of year? Cookie recipes always remind me of my mom who once worked in a bakery. We’d spend the Saturday after Thanksgiving making batches of our favorites to share with family and friends – Mexican Wedding Cookies, Kolaches, Swedish Oatmeal Cookies, Chocolate Chip, Holiday Many Way (peanut butter/nut/sugar), and my favorite to get creative with – cookie cutter sugar cookies. One year I painted them like stained glass with food coloring. Other times I iced them with different color frosting. Mom would make those first so I’d stay out of the way decorating while she zipped through making the rest.

Perhaps your cookie recipes are getting a tad frayed. Batter stains, greasy fingers, and age aren’t kind to those old recipe cards. About 20 years ago, when my kids were starting to cook on their own in the kitchen, I retyped our favorite recipes into size 12 font so that my older eyes could read them easily. Once done, I made a decorative cover from card stock and took it to Office Depot to have it GBC bound. My kids still rely on that book but we’ve accumulated so many new recipes over the years that I decided it was time for an updated version.

I scanned the old book to my computer and have added new favorites. Instead of printing, I just share Google Docs with my kids. I keep a laptop in my kitchen so it’s easy for me to find the desired recipe and bring it up while I prepare the meal. The recipes have been shared so if one system fails there is a backup. No killing trees or clutter from another book. Since I store in the cloud, I can even look up ingredients needed when I’m at the grocery store. No excuses not to cook up some love!