Welcome to 2019! It’s my first post of the year and I am excited to see what 2019 has in store for me and my blog. In my last post of 2018 I examined my progress on all the goals I set for myself last year. Now it’s time to start off the year with a fresh batch of goals!
Last year I bit off a little more than I could chew with my genealogy goals. I ended the year with several boxes left unchecked, including an entire category. This year I have a better understanding of the free time I can devote to genealogy and I have adjusted my goals accordingly. Some of my goals will be a continuation of last year’s goals while others are brand new projects.
Continuing from last year:
- Blog weekly – I plan to published a blog post each Saturday morning through 2019. Subscribe to my blog if you want to keep up with my posts!
- Watch 2 webinars per month – I have renewed my Legacy Family Tree webinar subscription and registered for many of the upcoming webinars on the calendar!
- Complete 2 ancestor story projects – I started both of these in 2018 but they were put on hold. I plan to resume work and complete them in 2019.
- Stephen Irwin’s biography – I am waiting on the Civil War pension file of his brother-in-law to provide additional insight into Stephen’s life.
- L. G. Anderson’s sketch and history of his business – I started writing a biographical sketch of LG, but quickly realized it would go best as the introduction to a history of the four-generation business he founded. That will require obtaining some additional business records, which I hope to get this year.
New goals:
- Read 5 books about genealogy methodology – The exact titles will be determined based on what new books are released in 2019 and what records or places my research takes me to. I don’t often devote much time to reading nonfiction, so hopefully this goal will motivate me to make more time for educational reading.
- Visual phasing of mom’s DNA – I am fortunate that my parents each have two siblings to test. I am hoping that undertaking this project in 2019 will help me learn more about the process of visual phasing so I will later be able to apply it to my dad’s DNA.
- Arrange and describe the family archive – Everything was essentially “appraised” in 2018, which consisted of determining what to keep, discarding or re-homing the rest, and rehousing the items into archival storage containers. Now that understand the scope of the collection, I need to refine the arrangement of the items, folders, and containers. After that I will label the folders and boxes to identify the contents.
I think this list seems challenging but manageable. I like setting goals that push me a little, rather than make a to-do list.
Have you set goals for yourself in 2019? I’d love to hear about them in the comments!
Ellen Anderson
Andersonology 
Great post! (Thanks for the inspiration to go and make my own goals – specifically genealogy-related goals).
I am newbie that has dabbled on and off for a few years. I am just getting back into it and have set goals each year and failed terribly. However I am inspired reading yours and will revisit mine for this year to help motivate me. One thing I want to do more is blog. I started a blog but as with my research it has been neglected. I just signed up for an introduction to genealogy class hoping this also will get me back on track. I am looking forward to meeting more people so I can keep the fire burning this time around. Thanks for this great post.