Spanish Genealogy Classes

Family History Library

In January 2015 there will be two Spanish genealogy classes offered by the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Saturday, January 3, 2015 at 1:00pm
Saturday, January 17, 2015 at 1:00 pm

Click here for more information.

Simple Christmas Projects for Children

Photo Credit: USMC

There is nothing better during the Christmas season than little projects with your kids...yours, mine, ours, the neighbors, cousins, etc. The holiday season is a fun time to bond together and create lasting memories. FamilySearch has some great ideas for Christmas projects to do with children. Check out the ideas here.

Christmas Ideas and Traditions

Photo Credit: AlexR

Can you believe that it is Christmas time again? I love Christmas! It is so fun to get together with family and friends and celebrate the birth of our savior, Jesus Christ. Christmas is also a great time to create those lasting family memories and traditions that bind us together for a lifetime!

Our family has created some fun traditions over the years:

We do the traditional scripture reading.
When the kids were little, we acted out the nativity scene.
We have Christmas stockings and a tree. The tree is decorated with many ornaments that the kids have made over the years!
We always participate in our neighborhood food drive for the food bank.
For our Christmas dinner, we choose and prepare food from different countries.
We send Christmas cards.
We take lots of pictures.
We call family members that don't live close to us.
We used to bake Christmas cookies until I finally admitted that I don't like to bake. Some years my husband does the cookies now and some years we do without!
This year we created a family cookbook. Hopefully my kids will open it and at least look at the family history pictures.
At the moment, our favorite tradition is creating photo books for each of our grandkids. They are priceless and the grandkids love to see themselves through the past year. Desktop publishing has become so easy and affordable that my husband looks forward to creating the books every year.

As you can see, there are many, many ways to create family traditions. The list above is just a sampling of our family traditions. For more ideas, see these Christmas Ideas from FamilySearch!

Laura Bush and daughter Jenna at RootsTech 2015

Laura Bush

Jenna Bush Hager

Laura Bush and her daughter, Jenna, will be the keynote speakers on Friday, February 13, 2015 at RootsTech 2015. Learn more about them here. There is still time to register for RootsTech 2015.  Passes start at $19.

December 7, 1941--A Day That Will Live in Infamy

Photo Credit: By USN [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons 

Pearl Harbor in Hawaii was attacked by the Japanese on December 7, 1941. The United States had been able to stay out of WW II up to that point. December 7th changed all of that. FamilySearch has created a Pearl Harbor Memorial Page. Watch the video and learn about that day from someone who was there. Click on your ancestors tab. Who knows, you may have had an ancestor connected to Pearl Harbor and didn't even know it! Even if you don't there are veterans out there who would love to share their Pearl Harbor stories with you.

Do You Have Irish Roots?

Photo Credit: Georgie Sharp

The National Library of Ireland will have a dedicated website of Catholic parish registers available online by summer 2015. They will be free, although there may be a few records that will be behind a pay wall. Read about this coming online collection here.