I’ve updated the summary of years covered in The Year Was… and you can access the entire list by clicking here. We’ve now covered sixty-four years ranging from 1776 through 1969. Feel free to add your own memories or family stories from a particular year in the comments section for that year, as well as any events that I didn’t cover. It’s tough to fit a whole year’s worth of news in that space in the newsletter, but on the blog we have plenty of space and your stories will help add another dimension to the “news of the day.” 

I was also browsing through the photo section of the blog and realized we now have more than one hundred posts with photographs on the blog. (It’s probably closer to two hundred individual photos, since I typically post two at a time.) I’ve even heard from several people who have found ancestors in this growing collection! You can browse all of the photographs by clicking on the Photo Corner link in the Categories side bar. In fact you can browse any of the online categories (e.g., Quote for Today, Book and Movie Club, Your Quick Tips, etc.) by clicking on these sidebar links.

Search the Blog

Did you know the blog is also searchable? Using the search box in the upper right corner of the page, you can search by author, keyword, or search for your family surnames to see if there is a photo available or if someone who shares your surname posted a tip on our site.

One last note-we’ve recently installed Akismet on the blog to help reduce the number of spam posts. I was receiving upwards of four and five hundred a day and although many were caught in moderation, some managed to get through. I try to keep up, but if you see any spam on the blog, please email me the URL of the post ([email protected]) and I’ll get out there and remove it. This new spam filter seems to be working much better so it shouldn’t be as much of a problem as in the past. My only fear is that it might pull in some of your comments. If you post a comment and it doesn’t appear on the blog, you can also email me about that. I have heard a lot of good things about Akismet and don’t anticipate any problems. Plus, now that I don’t have to spend so much time weeding through spam, I can focus more on content. 😉

Hope you all have a great weekend!

Juliana

P.S. This photograph is of our dog Annabelle in celebration of her having defeated Blastomycosis (a fungal disease that infects the lungs). Her xray last month showed all clear and this morning I gave her the last of her medication. Yeah!