Clark's Family Tree

I was really excited when Clark came home with a family tree assignment! We went through and found pictures of his four generations Then he and Jason glued them to the tree Clark created. He was so funny about a few things. He absolutely HAD to have a picture of Kara on the poster. Then he wanted me to label my mom and dad with step-grandma and step-grandpa. I told him that they weren't his step-grandma and step-grandpa, so I wouldn't do it. Then he asked what they were called when they were little. I told him that their names were Ben and Cathy. So he wanted me to write that. We finally got down to the bottom of things when we realized that he didn't want his class to know that he called them his Gigi and Boompa since those were non-traditional names. He is so funny sometimes. I decided to write both Gigi and Boompa and Ben and Cathy on the poster. Ha!

all present and accounted for

19 Days! It's almost here! On April 2nd the NARA will release images of the 1940 US Census so that it can be indexed, and I'm going to help!! Doesn't that sound exciting?! I think it does.

Back in high school I started researching my family history. It was always amazing to me to be able to see records of my family from when they were alive. I remember being at the Grundy County Courthouse and finding a Naturalization record of a family member. It was the actual document and had his signature on it. He had actually had signed that piece of paper. I thought it was pretty cool.

Anyway...the 1940 Census is here and it needs to be indexed so that I can search it for my family members. I'm hoping to get some more pieces of the puzzle that I'm working on that is my family history.

If you'd like to help too, you can sign up here at this link.

Grandpa's Journal

We decided to tackle a HUGE project for Jason's family this Christmas. We started the project back in August and worked on it each Sunday through December. We finished with about a week to spare!!

Jason's grandpa wrote his life story down in four handwritten journals. We decided that it would be nice if each family member had a copy of the book. So we decided to type the journals. Each Sunday afternoon, Jason would take care of the kids while I typed my little fingers raw (slight exaggeration!). 

Isn't it lovely?

We put photos many of the photos that we have of grandpa and his things in the book as well. It really took the book to the next level! I'm glad we had so many photos to work with.

I can't talk about grandpa without putting in a note about his Skull Collection... "One more thing that I should touch on, without which my journal would not be complete...I have a skull collection." He listed his entire collection. He also included all of the birds that he has seen in his lifetime. Very interesting!

The last few pages of each journal has lined pages for the owner to write their own personal memories of grandpa.

The journal maxed out at 221 pages. Wow! We also included a DVD at the back of each book with the scans of handwritten pages and the PDF of the typed file. We had them bound at Staples. Once we started working with an associate who was a little more committed, we didn't have any troubles!

Grandpa really gave his family such a gift with his wonderful record. I'm glad that we were able to take his gift and have it bound for the entire family to enjoy.