It’s Saturday Night
Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission Impossible! music) is to:
A) Genea-Blogger Linda Stufflebean created a “December Genea-Meme” – so this is our challenge for Saturday Night. Thank you, Linda!!
B) Copy the 20 questions below to your own blog post or to a word processor, and answer the questions.
Here’s are the 20 questions:
1. What is one genea-accomplishment this year of which you are proud?
One thing that I’m in the process of accomplishing during 2022 is blogging every day. Since I tend to write ahead, I have about 8 days in December for which I have yet to write a blog post. If you had told me as a high school student that I would be writing this much, I would have told you that you were crazy!
2. Is there a particular song that when you first hear it, tells you that the holidays are here?
I don’t know that there is any one particular song that I hear on the radio or music services that makes me think of the holidays. However, when it comes to church, there is one song that seems to be the one song sung year after year at the start of the adven season: O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.
3. Share a holiday memory which is special for you.
I’m not sure that I have any holiday memories that are more special than others.
4. Has your family passed down any holiday stories?
The one holiday story that has been passed down in the story of the birth of my twin brothers.
5. Which past genea-gift have you really appreciated?
While I didn’t receive it at Christmas time, the genea-gift that I really appreciated was the gift from fellow faculty members at the time of my retirement. I received. This cash gift allowed me to purchase a yDNA test that has since been upgraded to a BigY test.
6. Does your family cook any holiday recipes that have been handed down?
While these recipes are no longer prepared every year, I have three recipes that were prepared yearly while growing up.
- Frozen fruit salad — my grandmother found this recipe and would bring it to Christmas dinner
- Sugar cookies — my mom had a sugar cookie recipe that I still use. Since I was diagnosed as pre-diabetic, I did not make any sugar cookies this year.
- Pecan Caramel Roll — My mother would make a variety of candy at Christmas time: fudge, divinity, nougat, peanut brittle, pralines and pecan caramel roll. While I haven’t made this recipe for quite some time, it is still my favorite.
7. What is your favorite holiday song?
My favorite holiday song is O Holy Night.
8. Is there a holiday song that you wish was forgotten forever?
I can’t think of one.
9. What is one (realistic) item on your Genea-Santa list this year?
While my wish for 2023 is somewhat realistic, it may not be something that Genea-Santa can deliver at Christmas time. My wish is to take a genealogy trip to the area of Garrard county, Kentucky.
10. What is one item on your not-so-realistic wish list for Genea-Santa?
Enough people completing BigY tests to find a common ancestor for my Crawford line and to show how descendants of Alexander and Mary (McPheeters) Crawford connect.
11. What holiday meal will be served?
In an effort to keep my husband healthy, we will likely stay home for Christmas. Thus, smoked pork chops and baked potatoes will be our Christmas dinner.
12. Will your family reminisce about past holidays when you get together?
Since we aren’t getting together, I doubt that we will be doing much reminiscing.
13. Will you travel to spend the day with others?
With RSV, influenza and Covid-19 showing increases in cases in Kansas, my husband and I will likely avoid travel this holiday season in an attempt to avoid getting sick.
14. Do you have old family holiday photos or home movies that will be viewed this year?
Growing up, my grandmother would take ‘movies’ each Christmas. We would watch those movies over and over. Thus, those movies are the basis for many of my childhood memories. Unfortunately, the film deteriorated before we were able to convert it.
15. Did you break through any brick walls in 2022?
While I still need to do more research on the line, I found that my ancestor, Rachel Harris, is likely a granddaughter of Daniel Harris and Elizabeth Demarest on her father’s side and Major Simon Gerrit VanArsdale and Rachel Banta on her mother’s side. This takes those lines back to early New York.
16. Has your family shared any holiday recipes/activities or ??? which have become new yearly traditions?
Since my husband and I do not have children, our holidays are often different from families with children. However, we started ushering for Christmas eve services at The Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, Kansas. Since we were traveling to the Kansas City area to serve as ushers, we would sign up for most of the evening. This ‘tradition’ ended in 2018 when my husband had a severe case of pneumonia. Even though we had to stay home that year, I was able to watch the Christmas Eve services online. With Covid, watching the Christmas Eve services has become a new ‘tradition’.
17. Do you have a 2022 genea-goal which could have been accomplished, but over which you’ve procrastinated?
YES! One of my 2022 goals was to ‘back up’ my blog. And I would get an ‘F’ for this goal.
18. Do you participate in any holiday activities with your neighbors?
Probably not.
19. Think – if you had to choose right this minute – which ancestor would you most like to meet?
This one’s easy: JAMES CRAWFORD
20. What is one of your 2023 genealogy goals?
Even though I have completed my 2022 research goals, I’ve yet to write my goals for 2023. In my pondering of those goals, I keep coming back to how writing research notes helped me find ‘holes’ in my research.
Thus, my 2023 goals will likely include creating research notes for my grandparent, great grandparents and 2nd great grandparents. Then, I will likely start working on updating research of my 4th great grandparents.
If you don’t want to spend the extra money to have a company back up your blog, try blog2print. The books aren’t cheap, but they have a PDF option that is only $9.95. I blog every day and, with images, I need to create 2 PDFs each year covering 6 months each. It’s easy to use and the PDFs are delivered within a few minutes.
I think you told me about that last January and I haven’t gone back to look at comments yet. THANKS for the reminder!