Lilian's Tree

It was announced on 13 January that FHDU2021 will be a virtual conference, please check the website for details. Yippie, now I can go. Well what a messed up 12 months we have had, Covid-19 has thwarted plans for genealogy get togethers, worldwide  with BUT Allan Phillips and his intrepid crew have got FHDU organised. March 22-26 at Maroochy RSL. Maroochydore on the beautiful Sunshine Coast. The program is packed with excellent speakers, like Carol Baxter, John Boeren, Janet Frew, Shauna Hicks and Mel Hulbert to name five of the 28 listed on the speakers page. Now if you are one of the very lucky ones, allowed to travel, I hope you have a look at the bookings and try to go. Me, well I'm waiting for FHDU 2022, when... maybe... I can travel outside my home state. This link, below takes you to the home page and you can browse from there. https://www.familyhistorydownunder.com/  

Woken, again by the laughter of kookaburras, I looked out the window to see that the river was shrouded in a soft mist, making sunrise softer. After such a beautiful start to the day, we settled into the downstairs lounge for Helen Smith's talk about FindMyPast and how to access their record sets. Again this is a site I subscribe to and Helen explained some very useful things, that I didn't know about. Then Michelle Patient gave a wonderful talk on DNA, condensing a two day talk into about 21/2 hours and she gave us a link to a handout. While my head was spinning, with the complexity of how DNA works, Michelle's talk did make it easier to understand and I'm going to take a closer look at my results. Michelle recommended Blaine T Bettinger's book, The Family Tree Guide to DNA Testing and Genetic Genealogy, (on my to read pile). I got my copy from SAG but you can get it from Amazon in both book and Kindle forms. The book has three sections, G...

Sydney is having a cold wet day, just the day to read. Below are three that I have on my bedside table. Sweet Tomorrows, is the last in the Rose Harbor Inn series. A beautiful read, that took me a day. Debbie Macomber writes great books and I am waiting to see if she does another series. Writing and Publishing Gripping Family Histories, by Carol Baxter, was my treat at the conference. Carol's 'How To' books are easy to read and full of useful ideas. Great for the Genealogist! I have just started The Doctor Calling, by Meredith Appleyard and am loving it. Set in South Australia, it is another good Australian story. I've also been reading from my Kindle. Bye for now, Lilian

A keynote address, started the afternoon session. Roger Kershaw spoke on Tracing free emigrants to Australia. Much of what he spoke on is available here as part of the Joint Copying project. It was very interesting. Carol Baxter gave a very useful talk, Help! What information is correct? - strategies for determining historical truth. Ways we can work out what is correct. Her book is very useful on the topic. Last session for today, Colleen Fitzpatrick, had us laughing at how a group worked out how to fix a date to a picture. Her talk was titled, Not, just the facts, Ma'am, give me the big picture.  The picture was a man, sitting on a dead horse, in Wisconsin. Makes me think that I should re look at  some of mine. I'm tired, but have had a great time. Dinner was at the Pancake Parlour and then a wander around the shops. Feet up and a book to read, will end my day. Bye for now, Lilian