I'm Jen Rickards aka Auntie Jen! Welcome to my blog. I chose the name Auntie Jen because my nephews always refer to me as Auntie. It's also a name that I've used in the past for one of my great Aunt's that I was very close to. And who do you always get the greatest stories and information from? Your crazy Aunt, of course. Aunts always seem to have not only the best stories but the most secrets, and my research has definitely unearthed plenty.
I first got into genealogy in 2012. I had just moved back to Missouri from Colorado in 2011 and my grandma was wanting to pass special things along to me since she was getting along in years. Along with her special costume jewelry and figurines, she gave me a couple of boxes of old photos. She knew how much I loved photos. I'd never seen these before. They were just thrown into the boxes, no rhyme or reason. Some were water damaged, torn or just not in very good condition. The photos that were in good condition had a lot of people that were unknown to me. Sadly at the time, my grandma's mind was not as sharp as it used to be. There were days when she had clear memories, and others when she didn't. Mom knew some of the people in the photos, but not all of them. I was surprised to see some photos dated back as early as the 1900s. Wow! So I decided to take on the daunting task of labeling these photos.
I knew the first thing I needed to do was to create a tree. I started filling in the names and dates that I knew for sure. One thing that helped tremendously was a little datebook that had been passed down. Half of it was written in German, the other half translated. That helped with tracing back to my 3x great-grandma. (I have since learned some of the information in this book was incorrect) Once I started plugging in names and getting hints and documents, I was hooked.
Now I'm working on both mine and my husband's family trees. I've been able to trace most family members back to when they first came to the United States. I've found cases of murder, insanity, war heroes and interesting stories about run-ins with historical figures. But probably one of the most exciting things I've found is I have more family than I ever thought I had. I found the other side of my grandma's family (the ILG family), whom I never knew existed before. That was one of the most exciting finds. As you will see from my blog posts that this was not the only exciting thing I have found while doing my research. Seriously, you have to check out all that I found.
My dad likes to ask me, "How far are you going to trace back?" Well, my first goal was to just put names to photos. Then it was to trace back to when the family first came to the United States. Yeah, that didn't stop me. I have traced family now in France and Germany. Honestly, I don't know if I ever will stop. There is always one more thing to find. My goals change often as far as my research goes. Once I accomplish one, another pops up. So, while I'm able to research, I will keep researching. I have started doing family trees for friends now as well just because I love doing the research. I hope to one day make this into a career of some sort. I don't know where this journey will lead me, but I will keep following it until I do.
Now, both my husband and I have taken DNA tests. Mine was through 23 and Me and his was through Ancestry. His was not so surprising, but mine sure is! I might also do mine through Ancestry to see if it is consistent and try to connect with other family members.
The purpose of this blog is to share my journey through genealogy. I'm hoping the information I gather about my family will be helpful to others possibly researching the same line. I will also share tips I've learned about doing genealogy research as well as information about local history and how to find certain records. Don't forget to check the other tabs at the top of my blog. I have a YouTube Channel and I share some crafts relating to family history. Thank you for checking out my blog and I hope you follow along with me as I climb my trees to see what kind of nuts fall out.
I hope you have enjoyed reading my blog post for the 52 Ancestors Challenge. As I stated in the past blog post, I will not be participating in the 52 Ancestors Challenge for 2020. I will still continue to write for my blog but will be focused more on specific ancestors this year. So stay tuned for more stories about my family.
Happy New Year!!
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