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    Category: Getting Organized


    RootsMagic

    In my effort to explore software alternatives, I gave RootsMagic a try. They offer RootsMagic Essentials for free, so why not? I also found review of v.6 and digging around more on that site, I learned that Tamura Jones actually recommends RootsMagic over Legacy. There are a lot of geek reasons for this — I won’t pretend to have understood a lot of the techy talk on that site — but the recommendation is a good place to start.

    “RootsMagic Essentials is a free genealogy program that contains many core features from the award-winning RootsMagic family tree software. Downloading RootsMagic Essentials is absolutely free and is the easiest way to start tracing your family tree!”

    The key word there is “start.” Don’t try this at home if you have already invested years in your genealogy database.

    My first mistake was forgetting the distinction between RootsMagic . . . [Yes! There’s more!]

    1 March 2017 | Category: Getting Organized, Software | Leave a comment

    Legacy Family Tree 9

    Long post, so bottom line: No, I’m not upgrading. I’m not even going to spend the time to find out what new features Legacy is rolling out.

    In my efforts to get more organized, I thought I might start from scratch, software-wise — definitely not from scratch entry-wise. Made that mistake a couple of years ago and I still haven’t restored even a fraction of my photos, documents and sources. This is painfully evident from the lack of documentation appearing on the website. But this was necessary since all my “let’s put this over there” silliness finally caught up with me and it really was easier to start over than to try to correct all those paths or find all those files. I retained the names, facts., etc., in the original family file, though. Whew.

    Anyway —

    I’ve been using Legacy Family Tree pretty much from . . . [Yes! There’s more!]

    25 February 2017 | Category: Getting Organized, Pet Peeves, Software | Leave a comment

    Jessica Reynolds Completes Her Family History Binder Posts

    Jessica Reynolds has completed her final segment on how she created the family history binder as a gift for her father-in-law. The posts address the materials she used and how to obtain them, the how and why of her dividers, sections on photos, timelines, maps, and the documents she included — the last one being the one I was waiting for. 😀

    It’s a wonderful project and she’s set forth great ideas on how to handle such things as including information on photos in an easily accessible and readable way.

    Even though she says she created the blog to as an easy way to answer the flood of questions she received when she first mentioned her project in The Organized Genealogist Facebook group, I’m just guessing we might see more of her creative ideas posted on her blog. I, for one, am going to continue to follow . . . [Yes! There’s more!]

    12 January 2017 | Category: Getting Organized, Websites | Leave a comment

    Jessica Reynold’s Family History Binder

    Last week, Jessica Reynolds posted information in The Organized Genealogist Facebook group about a family history binder that she made for her father-in-law for Christmas. It really is amazing.

    Her post generated so much interest and questions about how she did it, she’s created a blog about her process called Do as I’m Doing. This is great news for those of you who aren’t on Facebook.

    Her father-in-law, of course, was thrilled with the gift. What a great idea!

    29 December 2016 | Category: Getting Organized, Websites | Leave a comment

    FINALLY Get Organized! 2016 Weekly Checklists from Dear Myrtle!

    Lately, I’ve been receiving more inquiries than usual. You know, “Do you have this?” and “What do you know about that?” I think it’s probably because this is the time of year when people who’ve been busy all summer are settling down by a warm fire to spent their winter months digging up ancestors. I know I get most of my work done when it’s too chilly outside for other endeavors.

    Unfortunately, because of my inability to come up with a system and stick with it for more than a couple of weeks, sometimes I do know I have what they’re looking for, but I’ll be darned if I can find it! Any of my systems work just fine. But I can’t seem to turn off “What if we . . .” So I have copies on copies on copies, in books and in digital format, of all the research . . . [Yes! There’s more!]

    31 December 2015 | Category: Getting Organized | Comments are closed