It’s over a week into the New Year; we move on again into something new. It is hard to keep pace with what is happening in the world. Things change so fast. We all need to keep up; else we’ll be left behind.
New.
AncestorFamily is expanding. As you would most likely be aware with the announcement made in the last post of 2025 – YouTube channel is being reactivated. There have been a few technical difficulties but they will be worked out eventually. The first instalment occurs in a few days with the introductions of our AI presenters. Mark your calendars for Wednesday 14 January when the first episode occurs.
Throughout the recent holidays, getting some research done has been a challenge but small steps are always best. Focusing is the main issue here.
Most of you would be aware that when it comes to research, an appropriate question is created so things can move forward. As an exercise, pick one ancestor to start with. Create a question, even if it’s “Check and validate a source found elsewhere that was added to the ancestor”. Once done, update notes and move on. During the process stay focused! Don’t go down the many rabbit holes that you come across. Make a note of “other” findings but go back to the task in hand. It is amazing that something so simple is, at times, difficult to not stray from the path – oops the question at hand.
What happens if?
As you go through the process, you may find an error with the record you are investigating.
My example is: a particular document found showing conflicting details. This usually occurs when you have several people with the same name across several families. I had the incorrect document attached to an individual. When doing the checking, it was clearly incorrect – a birth from Parish records had different parents! Name, date and place were all correct, but! Yes, I had the wrong parents.
No comment… This happens when you rush and don’t check everything.
Correcting Errors.
My example, above, needed to be corrected. What I found was, I’d skipped a generation. The parents were in fact the grandparents. How can this be?
Think about all the same names within families like there are, say six children in one family and another has four. They all called their children the same names. Then, these children have children and they name them with the same names. It gets more than confusing. One thing to always note is: if a child dies, on many occasions the parents will name another child with the same name just because… I am sure many of you have come across online trees where the child that died at a young age goes on to marry, have children and… It is a mess.
It just takes one hint and bang. It’s copy, copy, and copy. The tree is incorrect. I have been there, done that!
Time.
The biggest takeaway is not to rush. I know it’s 2:00 a.m. and you want to go to bed. Make a note. Leave it. Go to bed. Don’t just think, oh it’s correct. Rush – add the record – forget about it. Several weeks later or even months, you go back to it, not realising the mistake and add to it, making it worse! You can save so much time by not rushing. I know it’s easily said than done. I know but… Go to bed!
Next time.
Our next post will be on Friday 23 January at the usual time. When I look back to when I started this blog, it is hard to believe that nearly three years ago it all began. Next time we’ll do some reflections, as well as the YouTube special on Monday 26 January. Till then…
Explore & Discover.
Acknowledgements:
All pics & photos have been created in Canva.
Ancestor Family 