Winter Games 2010 - Days 6 to the End

My Winter Games progress has been impeded by my very busy work schedule and two sick children, one worse than the other. What started as a simple head cold morphed into an ear infection and bronchialitis caused by RSV. Nobody is getting much sleep because we have to do nebulizer treatments every 4 hours, day or night! This is definitely something to document in my journal for little M. Hopefully she recovers quickly.

So a recap of my medal standing:

Category 1. Cite Your Sources: I have managed to cite six census entries, which also includes a transcription of the family, so it's time consuming. Not what I wanted, but it's six more than when I started. It also means I finished all the citations for the 1860 census that I have been working on as part of my database overhaul included as part of my Resolutions.

Medals Earned: none

Category 2. Back Up Your Data: I backed up my blog and my RootsMagic database. I also have backed up various files on my flash drive. My pictures were previously backed up on an external hard drive and I have added no new ones since that time.

Medals Earned: Gold (but I feel like I should have started at Bronze)

Category 3. Organize Your Research: I took a big (and I mean BIG) stack of papers and organized them into file folders by surname. Much more refined organization will have to take place at a later time, but at the present they are organized so at least I can find all relevant papers on a family line.

Medals Earned: Bronze

Category 4. Expand Your Knowledge: No changes here
Previous Medal Earned: Silver

Category 5. Write, Write, Write: No changes here
Previous Medal Earned: Silver

Category 6. Reach Out and Perform Genealogical Acts of Kindness: I found several "new to me" blogs to comment on and I found another way to give back as noted here.

Previous Medal Earned: Silver
Current Medal Earned: Gold

Congratulations to everyone who participated. Much was accomplished in the last two weeks!

Winter Games 2010 - Days 1-5

Here is a recap of my activities for Days 1 through 5 of the Geneabloggers Winter Games:

Category 4:
Task A: I used Google Maps to locate the various residences of my Grandpa Lee.
Task E: I created a Wordle of all the surnames I am researching which can be seen here.

Medal Earned: Silver

Category 5:
Task C: I have prepared several posts that will be published in March.
Task F: I participated in Challenge #7 of 52 Weeks to Better Genealogy using Google Maps.

Medal Earned: Silver

Category 6:
Task D: I have been doing some online parcel research in an adjacent county to where I live for a fellow geneablogger. I researched the county assessor's webpage and worked towards determining a cross street position so I could figure out what area of the city the property lies in. I communicated via email with the other researcher what I had found and how parcel maps could be obtained online through the county system. I also worked on another parcel to identify it's location in another Idaho county. I have not been as successful with locating this one, but will keep working on it.

Task G: I am following 11 blogs using the Follow feature on Blogger. Most of these blogs were not new to me. I hope to add some new-to-me blogs in the coming days.

Medal Earned: Silver

Not too shabby considering I have been working 10 hour days and spent Sunday being wife, mommy, and chief laundress.

Surname Silliness

After much struggle and with the help of my husband, here is my surname collage listing 27 of the names I am researching.

And this is all I have completed for the Geneabloggers Games Day 1. I spent the rest of my day at work and then with my family.

Let the Games Begin!

I have had a long love for the Olympic Games, both Winter and Summer, so I am very pleased to participate in the geneablogger community's Winter 2010 Geneabloggers Games. I am at my busiest time of the year for my real-life job, so if I am able to get anything above a Bronze medal in any of the events, I will consider it an accomplishment. And I also will challenge myself to work towards completing any of the challenges I am unable to do later this year.

Here is my flag representing my heritage from the countries of Norway, Great Britain (English and Scots-Irish) and Germany. To make it all fit I rotated the three bars of the German flag to fit vertically on the right rather than their typical horizontal display. I am 25% Norwegian through my maternal grandmother. All of her ancestral lines are from Norway and after they immigrated to the United States, those individuals married others from Norway. I have several lines of English and German descent from the remaining three grandparents. My paternal grandfather's line is Scots-Irish. And additionally my married name is German.

I intend to compete in the following categories:

1. Cite Your Sources. I was actually slowly working on this anyway so this will be a good motivator.

2. Back Up Your Data. I plan to complete at least one of these tasks.

3. Organize Your Research. I have some new city directory discoveries that need to be cited and filed away.

4. Expand Your Knowledge. I already have one thing I want to do in this category.

5. Write. Write. Write! I need to pre-post some items for my next two very busy months before I can resume regular posts and research.

6. Reach Out and Post a Genealogical Act of Kindness. I read many blogs but not always good at commenting so that will be my goal here.