Staycation Research Update

 

My week-long staycation is just about over. I was able to dedicate over 40 hours last week to my research. I wish I had more time, but it's back to work tomorrow. I have 6 people "pre-planned" for this coming week. There are a lot of records for these people, so my goal is simply to get thru these 6.

Since my last post on my new research plan (about 2 weeks ago), I reviewed and transcribed facts from 5 pages or handwritten notes my mother had assembled about her siblings and their children. This included several names, as well as birth and marriage dates I didn't have previously. I also added current and updated facts to several people based on an email I received from my maternal cousin a few weeks ago. I always cite this type of information as "Family Knowledge" and include the name of the person who provided the facts in my citation. 

I added 15 new people to my tree, for a total of 1572. Most new additions were 1st cousins 1x removed (children of my cousins and a few of their spouses).

Along the way, I also happened to run an "Undocumented Fact" report from FTM (my preferred desktop software). As expected, many entries were missing sources for sex (which should resolve as I work through my process) but I also discovered I had a bunch of facts I'd missed adding to sources somehow. As I'm reviewing each person, I'm resolving any issues as I'm completing their profile. 

I finished my review of 60 additional existing people in my tree, bringing my total completed to 99 (and nope, I just couldn't squeak out one more today to make 100). A few "completed people" have had hints pop up since my review (I'm not worrying about them right now), but in general my process seems to be working fairly well. As more record collections are added and updated, there will invariably be new hints for people I've already completed. Complete is only accurate until the next hint appears. And the beloved Ancestry algorithm is happily reaching out to find more hints for people on each branch of my tree as I'm working thru this new process. Shhhh...not that I'm looking at my hint count or anything.....but (...whispers...) it's up to  8240!

Image by Foundry Co from Pixabay