Have you ever spent an hour at the doctor’s office waiting for your turn, wishing you had something more interesting to do than scanning Facebook? Try the FamilySearch Tree Mobile App! I just discovered the “Descendants with Tasks” feature and it’s pretty smooth. You can go to an ancestor, view their profile, and click the menu button to see the “Descendants With Tasks” option. There you’ll see a list of all that ancestor’s descendants who have “tasks”...
by Nancy Kirkpatrick I’ve been thinking about a few things that I believe have helped people get started in family history. I have done these things at different times through the many years I have served as a consultant (or friend) to try and help people feel inspired to do family history work. First is bearing testimony. When I last served as a consultant a couple of years ago for our ward family history...
Today I’m interviewing my friend, Dafney Murray. She shares interesting insights into how her love for history has helped in her research, the benefits of sharing stories with her teenagers, and tips for researching enslaved ancestors. Tell us about yourself. Hi Nicole! I would describe myself as LDS for 25 years, an American of African descent, wife of 20 years, full time homemaker, mother of 2 teens and crazy about Family History! How did you get...
When I was 12, a generous family history consultant in my LDS ward in Seattle helped me copy the pictures of my ancestors to add to a little booklet I was making for a young women’s project. Her name is Nancy Kirkpatrick. Her passion and support was one of the keys to our family getting started in genealogy! Last week I got in touch with Nancy again, in a serendipitous way. I had started writing this post and asked...
Today’s post is by Devon from A Patient Genealogist. If you have an idea to share in a guest post, please contact nicole@familylocket.com. We’d love to hear what you’re doing to share, teach, and encourage others in family history! When we focus on stories of the heart, we turn people willingly to family history. Ask someone to tell you a story about a father, grandmother, or aunt and many will have no problem thinking of something. A...
Do you want to get started in Family History but you’re nervous about the time commitment or your abilities? Do you feel overwhelmed whenever you think about just getting started? Today I’d like to spotlight my friends and neighbors, the Rickenbach family. We belong to the same LDS ward and I’ve worked with their family for the last several months doing family history. Craig and Corinne took my beginning Family History Sunday School class in...
Elder Quentin L. Cook talked about the joy of doing family history work and preparing for the temple in his April 2016 General Conference talk, “See Yourself in the Temple.” I’ve created a family home evening lesson plan that you can use with your family to discuss this important topic. “The combination of increased numbers of temples and advanced technology to fulfill our sacred family history responsibilities for our ancestors makes this the most blessed...
In the recent LDS General Conference, church leaders spoke about a wide range of topics that comforted, taught, and inspired us. Many of the talks focused on personal conversion and our relationship with the Savior. Many other messages were about strengthening families and how we can improve our relationships with each other. As a family history consultant in my ward, the insights shared about why we should do family history research and proxy temple work for...
Today I want to share one of my favorite apps from the FamilySearch app gallery – Puzzilla! Puzzilla.org reads the data on your family tree and creates a compact, bird’s eye view of your pedigree. This is interesting for viewing your ancestors, but it’s incredible for viewing descendants. There is no better way to visualize your cousins than to see them plotted out in a Puzzilla descendancy chart. As you view cousins in this new...
In October 2014 General Conference, Elder Allan F. Packer spoke about family history in his talk, “The Book.” He said, Like partaking of the sacrament, attending meetings, reading the scriptures, and saying personal prayers, doing family history and temple work should be a regular part of our personal worship. He spoke about this on February 14, 2015 at the Family Discovery Day as well: Last year, our theme was “Igniting Interest in Family History,” and...