After publishing my first post, I started writing a multiple-part series I’d outlined about Randolph, Oregon. While waiting for Arnie Jensen’s (2017) book, No Place Like Home (an Inter-Library Loan request), I turned to online sources for local history. I found an overwhelming amount of information. The scholar in me took over, displacing the conversational tone of writing I’d intended. Soon my posts became a jumble of quotes, source citations, and footnotes. Trying to revise the drafts resulted in frustrating blog-writing sessions.
Since blog-writing wasn’t going well, I turned my attention to the online March 2022 RootsTech conference. The conference provides many possibilities for learning and connecting online. I narrowed my options to sessions from the “beginner” category. And, I limited myself to those seemingly most relevant to my present research and writing activities.
Because I want to write ancestor profiles, I found Cheri Hudson Passey’s (2022) presentation especially helpful: Somewhere in Time: Placing Ancestors in Historical Context. Other “beginner” webinars caught my eye, and I started taking notes so I could remember the many useful ideas. I now have clear direction for systematically reorganizing my data collection. Ideally the reorganization will facilitate both future research and blogging. To begin, I have written out a plan for reorganizing my data collection, with the goal to follow Savannah Larson’s advice to “mindfully organize at the speed of life.”
If systematically (re)organizing your family history data appeals to you, the following webinars provide helpful guidance: Savannah Larson’s (2021) three-part series on Creating YOUR Organizational System and her (2022) three-part series on Tricky Family Trees; also, Rebecca Whitman Koford’s (2021) three-part series on Research Logs.