A Little Over-Optimistic? Perhaps.

The topic for the 63rd edition of the Carnival of Genealogy is: New Year's Resolutions! Jasia asks us "What plans do you have for your genealogy research next year? How about for your blogging?"

First off, I don't make resolutions. However, I do set goals and have quite a "to do" list that seems to grow longer instead of shorter! It seems appropriate to me to take a look back at the past year and review the goals that were set for 2008 while establishing goals for 2009.

Blogging

2008 Goals: Continue blogging here at Kinexxions. Quality more than quantity. Contribute to every edition of the Carnival of Genealogy.

Results: I'm still blogging ;-) I like to think that, for the most part, the posts have been good, quality posts, but then I'm just a bit biased. There have been slightly fewer posts this year (308 so far, as opposed to 322 in 2007). I did contribute to most, but not all, editions of the COG.

Goals for 2009: Resume posting on my other blog, Whitley County Kinexxions, at least on a weekly basis. Continue to contribute to the COG and Smile for the Camera. Write a weekly biographical or research article about an ancestor or other relative. Continue with the Tombstone Tuesday and Wordless Wednesday posts.

Scanning

2008 Goals: Scan Mom's 10 family photo albums, my own family pictures, the letters written while in the Navy, and genea-documents.

Results: Mom's albums are 90% done. My niece handed over the box of her mother's pictures last week. She has them sorted but they still need to be attached to archival paper, scanned and put into albums. My letters have been scanned to both jpg and pdf formats. And, as far as the genealogy documents and papers are concerned, The end is in sight!

Goals for 2009: Finish the genea-document project by the end of February! Scan the pictures of my sister's family by the end of March. Review the box of pictures from my Dad and ensure they have all been scanned. Add captions and metadata to the image files that were scanned in 2008.

Sourcing and Database Cleanup

2008 Goals: The data that was entered into my genealogy software several years ago was not properly sourced at that time. Some sources were entered in notes. But there are some people who have no sources entered for any of their data.

Results: Not much, actually very little, progress on this. I did purchase and download version 7 of Legacy in August but still have not installed it. My reason? Rather lame, but I just haven't wanted to take the time to devote to learning the new features. And I really just want to get that scanning done!

Goals for 2009: Install Legacy 7 and learn the new features (after the existing scanning projects are finished). Ensure that all data entered has been sourced, preferably utilizing the Legacy 7 sourcing templates. Convert existing sources to the new format.

Research

2008 Goals: After reading what I wrote last year, it seems I didn't really set a research goal for this year, though I had a list of obituaries to look up in Elkhart.

Results: Continued research on the Fisher family but did not make it to Elkhart to look up those obituary notices (there's over 100 of them!). In January I resumed research on the Peter and Christina Wise family, which consumed the first three months of the year! For most of September I worked on the family of Henry and Anna Robison.

Goals for 2009: Several of my Joslin cousins and I are planning a research trip to Massachusetts, either in April or September. We'd like to find some documentation to confirm that our Jonas Joslin, born 1769, is indeed the son of Joseph and Sarah (Tarbell) Joslin of Leominster. Plus, we enjoy the company of each other and think it would be a fun excursion and a great excuse for getting together! Obviously, I'd like to make a bit of headway on those troublesome female ancestors (highlighted in the "Roadblock" series of posts) and on those "dead end" lines that are dangling out there in genea-never-never-land: Wise, Dunfee, Hazlett, and Jones.

Society Tasks

2008 Goals: Relieve myself of the responsibilities as editor and chief contributor of Whitley County Roots (the quarterly publication of the Genealogical Society of Whitley County). Finish three long-term transcription projects for the Society.

Results: Resigned as editor of Roots with the June 2008 issue being my last one. Completed two of the three transcription projects. The third one has been put on indefinite hold.

Goals for 2009: Don't take on any more projects for the Society. After nearly ten years of involvement and putting my own research on hold, priorities change. It may sound selfish, but right now my priorities are with my own personal projects!

Good Intentions

2008 Goals: The 12 items in My Plan to Prepare for Disaster, which I'm not going to list here. You'll have to read the post to figure out what I'm talking about...

Results: #1 is done, # 2 has yet to be started (well, two boxes have been opened but not sorted), did #3 but opted to do my own scanning, #4, 5, 6, and 7 are in process as part of the scanning projects, #8 isn't done but the files are backed up on two external drives, #9 is in process, #10 and #12 haven't even been thought about yet, #11 is in process (data is backed up nightly to an external drive).

Goals for 2009: keep on plugging away

Other 2008 Goals

• Try not to get distracted quite so much.
• Have more fun! Don't take myself quite so seriously.
• Make my task list shorter for 2009!

Results:

• Still easily distracted, especially on the internet. You know how those links can take you to places you never expected, sometimes really unexpected! Seems I just can't resist clicking through to see what's on the other side.
• Still take myself too seriously. Old habits are hard to break. Maybe when the scanning is done I'll have more fun!
• The task list for 2009 is just as long as it was for 2008. Does that make me a failure? Or just ridiculously over-optimistic? I mean, I did make some headway, but I really didn't complete even one of my goals for 2008! Ah, well, optimism is a good thing! I'm sure my list will be shorter in 2010!