A Look Back at 2016 and My Plans for 2017

Wow, 2016 seems to have flown by at a pretty good clip! I remember as a kid thinking that a year moves very slowly and wondering if the time would speed up when I was an adult, boy did it ever! 

Last year, I set seven short term goals for 2016 and while I didn't meet all of these goals I still feel that I accomplished a lot. Here are the goals I set for myself last year.

My Goals for 2016

1. Begin the NGS's American Genealogical Studies program no later than April 2016. NOT MET and I have postponed starting until this year.
2. Find more genealogy webinars and/or programs that are going to help me reach my goal of becoming a Certified Genealogist. DONE. But more are needed in my opinion.
3. Progress from writing for one blog to two. DONE. 
4. Contribute 2 to 3 posts about family for both blogs. Not including already set weekly and/or daily posts. DONE. However, not to my satisfaction and because of things "popping" in my biological family tree my weekly posts fell to the wayside.
5. Plan for at least one cemetery research trip close to home. DONE. I visited 3 cemeteries on a trip to Charleston.
6. Plan for at least one research trip for this year. Ideally I would like to plan at least one out of state and maybe 3 or 4 small day trips that are close to home. STARTED but not completed. I started with a trip to Charleston and then drove Savannah for a death certificate!
7. Add one new series of posts. That would be my "Remembering Those From the Past for the Future" inspired by Peggy Clemens Lauritzen and Ryan Kelly. I will publish these posts once a month. NOT MET. This was one I really wanted to do but found to be the most difficult. I have several half written posts about my son Kenny but the writing and the memories lead to a lot of tears that it makes it difficult to write. 

As you can see, two of my goals were not met. I did manage to meet five of them even though I feel I could have done better. I had intended my series, "Remembering Those From the Past for the Future" to be about my son Kenny so that his nephew, Easton (and any siblings he may have in the future) would be from my heart and how much he was loved. Unfortunately, even after nearly 17 years it is still painful. Trying to write through my tears when I can't see the keyboard proves to be difficult. I have decided to expand the scope of the series to write about other family members in the hope that Easton and company will learn about their ancestors from the memories of myself and others.

Another project I am instituting for both of my blogs is an idea I found on Facebook from a radio station in Columbus, Ohio known as 104.9 The River. You begin with an empty jar (the example shows a quart size Ball Mason Jar) and the goal is to fill the jar once a week with a note of something good that happened during that week. Then on New Year's Eve 2017, you read each of the notes to see what an amazing year you have had. I have decided to do this from a genealogical perspective to see what I can accomplish in one year doing genealogy. I have one really big candy jar that I will be using and I have chosen to use one color for Dawning Genealogy and one for Scarlet and Dawn.

In addition to the two projects listed above as my goals for 2017, I also have the following goals for 2017:

1. Begin the NGS's American Genealogical Studies program before the end of 2017.
2. Continue to find webinars, classes, books and other materials to reach my goal of becoming a certified genealogist.
3. Write at least 1 or 2 posts per week for each blog.
4. Plan at least 2 research day trips and 2 cemetery research day trips.

These are my honorable intentions for the coming year and I hope that next year I can write "DONE" next to all of them! What are your goals for 2017?