Looking Back... 2016

Looking back, here are some highlights of 2016.

In January I wrote a post titled "Making it in Alberta", explaining how you can freely find your ancestors' Alberta Land Records.

It was the most popular post of the past year.  I was honoured to have this article published in the Vernon BC History Society quarterly Journal .." Splitting Heirs".


April brought the A-Z Challenge and I decided to participate this year.  I started a new blog to do genealogy challenges and it was a fun experience. It was interesting... not just thinking up what to write for each letter, but meeting other genealogy bloggers and seeing the differences in what we come up with.

Over the summer my "Cigar Box" series was a big hit.

Here I chronicled the WWII contents of a cigar box I found among my fathers things. Since WWII is in the not-so-distant past there are not many personal posts about that time.


I also had the pleasure of being interviewed by the Wonderful Wendy Mathias for the Geneabloggers "May I Introduce to You.." series. 

The questions she asked made me reflect on how I got interested in genealogy and the reasons why I write my blog.


Other popular posts are the ones talking about government or sessional papers series. Although most of my samples are from Canadian papers, the same steps can be taken to find ancestors in the government papers of most countries. 


I added new PDFs to the Resources page, which is also a very popular part of my blog. I hope everyone is downloading and sharing these sets of free resources.

Another popular post of the past year, believe it or not since my following is global, was a Serendipity Sunday post titled "Toronto Landmarks and Homes". The popularity was most likely due to fellow Canadian genealogist Gail Dever featuring this post in her "Crème de la crème" post that week. Thanks Gail! 


The most popular article of all time is still "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World!" which I posted in August 2014.

That is a phrase I have heard a lot in 2016, let's hope 2017 is a better year!

I wish you all a very Happy New Year 🎇

Looking Back... 2015

Happy New Year readers and loyal followers!


I look back on 2015 and I realize I accomplished quite a lot in my genealogical world.
I wrote 122 posts that were researched to help people find their ancestors that were everything from horticulturists, robbers and victualers to Post Office workers and also about the cost of living in days of yore. I published six handy downloadable Resource lists.

I unraveled the mystery of Hannah Mead, who appeared as a child with my ancestor's family on the census. That question had been niggling at me for a long time.


I started a new blog, The Days of Their Lives, telling stories of my ancestors.

I published my sixth family history book, a few years of research in the making.

What will 2016 bring?
I have a few projects in mind and finishing any one of them will make me happy.

So here's to a fresh start and endless possibilities!

Auld Lang Syne (click image)