Saving Memories Forever Announces New Partnerships

I received the following email from Saving Memories Forever.  Sounds like great partnerships, especially with Kim Weitkamp.

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Saving Memories Forever Announces Strategic Partnerships with APPO and Kim Weitkamp

July 2, 2013 – St. Louis, Missouri. Saving Memories Forever, a dynamic online way to create and preserve family memories, is pleased to announce its new alliances with two new partners: the Association of Personal Photo Organizers (APPO) and Kim Weitkamp. Both APPO and Kim are well known in their respective fields and are committed to providing their customers with new ways of preserving family stories.

Association of Personal Photo Organizers (APPO)

Saving Memories Forever is proud to announce that it has been selected as a partner by the Association of Personal Photo Organizers (APPO). As stated on its Partnership page at its website, APPO “continually researches, identifies and partners with the best in the industry to ensure our customers and members have access to the most updated and highest quality service and tools available today.” We’re pleased to be working with individual APPO consultants in offering their clients a new way to record family stories that help bring photographs and other family mementos to life.  See http://www.appo.org/Strategic-Partners for more information.

Kim Weitkamp

We are excited to announce a new partnership with Kim Weitkamp, nationally-known storyteller and speaker. Kim has been brought on as the exclusive storyteller for Saving Memories Forever and will be providing articles, blog tips and audio storytelling tips for the Saving Memories Forever application. Click here to visit Kim’s content at the Saving Memories Forever website - see and hear Kim's quick tips for gathering your family stories. Also visit Kim’s website at http://www.kimweitkamp.com/ and just try to keep up with all her great projects and offerings!

Harvey Baker, co-founder of Saving Memories Forever states, “We’re excited to be working with the consultants at APPO as well as fantastic storyteller Kim Weitkamp. Saving Memories Forever recognizes that there is more than one approach to telling a good family story. Some use family photos to inspire while others try to capture the oral history they remember being shared during family reunions and events. With the help of our new partners, Saving Memories Forever will find the inspiration they need to get started in sharing family histories – one story at a time.”

About Saving Memories Forever

Saving Memories Forever™ provides a new online system to not only create and preserve family memories, but also build legacies through audio recordings. Each subscriber has a dedicated area on the site to upload and manage their recordings. Recordings on the SMF website are categorized, private, secure, and permission based. The basic package is free. Subscriptions with many additional features are offered at just $3.99 per month. A new zipfile feature gives users the option of backing-up their stories at home. A how-to-video provides step-by-step instructions. For additional information visit http://SavingMemoriesForever.com.

Winners Announced for the 2012 GENEii Family History Writers Contest

A big congratulations to all the winners of the Southern California Genealogical Society’s 2012 GENEii Family History Writers Contest.  Below is the list of winners in each of the two contest categories.  Each of the winning entries will be published in The Searcher, which is the quarterly journal of SCGS.

Category 1 (1,000 to 2,000 words)

First Place	Ben Chinoy
Second Place	Janice Preston Horton
Third Place	Linda Gartz
Finalist	Sylvia Ney
Honorable Mention	Virginia McGee Butler
Honorable Mention	Bonnie Herold

Category 2 (under 1,000)

First Place	Jeffery Cohen
Second Place	Willie Wilburn Walker
Third Place	Joyce Roberson
Finalist	Donna Gagnon
Honorable Mention	Mary E. Nelson
Honorable Mention	Peggy Spear

Be thinking about entries for the 2013 GENEii contest, which will start on November 1, 2013.

StoryPress: Big News!

I received the following press release from StoryPress and thought I’d pass it along to my readers.  Also note that during the RootsTech 2013 conference, DearMYRTLE spoke with Mike Davis about StoryPress. You can watch the five-minute interview here.

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AUSTIN, TX - Everyone has an important story to tell, and the free StoryPress app lets you easily save these stories to share with future generations. Since the v1 launch in December 2012, thousands have already downloaded.

Stories are not traditionally thought of as something that can be easily saved and shared. Most are never written down, and are too often forgotten. Use the free StoryPress app to capture your own personal history, or tell a loved one about it – we designed it to be unbelievably easy to use, even for seniors.

There is an authenticity in someone’s own voice that transcends time and carries more weight than any other element, and StoryPress is here to capture these moments – your favorite memories, your successes, and your funny stories – and let you share them with your loved ones.

The user can customize a cover, then either freely talk or choose a topic and be interviewed by our program. (Yeah, it’s pretty amazing.) Then the software automatically turns the audio recordings into an audio story permanently saved on our cloud.

Kickstarter Campaign

A 30-day Kickstarter campaign starting April 1 hopes to raise $15,000 to fund development of v2, which will integrate photos and music into completed audio stories.

Story@Home Instagram Photo Contest

Story@Home is a new addition to RootsTech this year.  Story@Home offers class sessions with award-winning storytellers, performers, and speakers to help attendees explore ways to use the power of story to connect with their family.  You can learn more about Story@Home on the RootsTech Conference website.

Story@Home is running an Instagram Photo Contest.  Here are the contest details:

Prize – Story@Home + Getting Started pass ($79 value), which is access to all Story@Home classes and Getting Started classes all three days of RootsTech 2013.

Contest Dates – February 20th-24th

How to Enter – Snap a picture you think tells a story.  Examples include family, friends, places, events, mementos—anything that has meaning for you.  Upload the photo to Instagram and share with Story@Home what story your photo tells. Include the hashtags #tellyourstory and #storyathome.

The winner will be chosen by Random.org and announced on the Story@Home Facebook page Monday, February 25, 2013. "Like" Story@Home on Facebook to find out if you've won.

Make a Commitment to Yourself, Participate in the Family History Writing Challenge Next Month

For the third year in a row, Lynn Palermo (a.k.a. The Armchair Genealogist) is hosting the Family History Writing Challenge.  This 28-day challenge begins on February 1 and ends on the February 28. 

By participating in the challenge, you are essentially making a commitment to yourself to write x-number of words each day about your family history.  It’s a fun way to set a goal and work toward that goal each day during the month of February.  What’s even better is that you will get tips and support along the way.  And because it’s a “community” event, there’s also a sense of camaraderie knowing that others are right there with you, sharing in your successes and, yes, sometimes your frustrations.

This year, because of my busy schedule, I’m going to pledge to write 200 words each day.  Last year I had a plan for what I was going to do, but I didn’t really stick to it.  So for this year, there’s no plan.  I’m just going to write 200 words on whatever aspect of my family history I feel like writing about that day.  It may seem like a very disjointed approach, especially if you know me and how I work.  But sometimes it’s the best approach for the creative process.  And because I plan to write haphazardly (even though it makes me cringe!), I’m going to start using Scrivener so I can at least manage my jaunts and tangents in some organized manner.  (Too bad the Scrivener class I signed up for doesn’t start until February 19.)

So what about you?  Will you make a 28-day commitment to write about your family history?  I’d love to hear about your plans, so please leave me a comment or a link to your blog post about the challenge.

Dallas Genealogical Society Announces Winners of 2012 Writing Contest

A few days ago, the Dallas Genealogical Society announced the winners of the 2012 Writing Contest that was held earlier this year.  Below is the press release that was issued. 

As soon as I get the details for the 2013 contest, I will post them on this blog.

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Dallas, TX—December 17, 2012—The Dallas Genealogical Society presented the winners of their 2012 Writing Contest with certificates of recognition and prize checks at their Annual Awards Luncheon on December 8, 2012.  Among the judges reviewing the contest entries was J. Mark Lowe, a professional genealogist.

The winners are:

First Place – $500

“Francis A. Claridge (1824-1887)” by Karen Claridge Walker (DGS member)

Karen is a native of San Antonio, Texas. She worked two years in the Tulsa City/County Library Genealogy Center; and is a serious amateur genealogist.  The article is about Karen’s paternal great-great-grandfather, to whom she said “she is grateful for having such an interesting life about which to write.”

Second Place – $300

“Bailing, Bigamy, and Brother Love: the Family of Henry Parker and Nancy Black” by Debbie Parker Wayne, CG^SM

Debbie Parker Wayne is a full-time genealogist experienced using laws and DNA analysis, as well as more traditional techniques, for genealogical research. Debbie is a Trustee for the BCG Education Fund, a board member and Advocacy Chair of the Association of Professional Genealogists (APG), president of the Lone Star Chapter of APG, and Texas State Genealogical Society’s DNA Project Director. She is part of the core staff at Angelina College Genealogy Conference and was the featured speaker on DNA at the Texas General Land Office’s 2011 Save Texas History Symposium.  Her website is at http://debbiewayne.com.

Third Prize (tie) – $150

“Sarah Luse Larimer (1836-1913): Indian Captive, Photographer, and Business Woman” by Loretta Luce Evans, AG^®

Loretta Evans, AG^® , is a freelance writer and lecturer with over 30 years of genealogical experience. Accredited in Midwestern United States research, she is a graduate of the National Institute on Genealogical Research in Washington, DC, and the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy. Her writings have appeared in a number of magazines, including Crossroads, Ancestry, Everton’s Genealogical Helper, Heritage Quest, the Genealogical Journal, and Ohio Records and Pioneer Families. Loretta has served as a Commissioner and as Public Relations Committee Chairman for the International Commission for the Accreditation of Professional Genealogists. Loretta recently spent almost two years as a volunteer for FamilySearch in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Third Prize (tie) – $150

“Chronology of Land Lot 128, District 20, Baldwin (Morgan) County, Georgia And How It Led to Polly Ware’s Maiden Name” by Barbara A. Ware (DGS Member and IT Administrator)

Barbara A. Ware is a third generation Texan.  She has been an active genealogist for 20 years, a member of the Dallas Genealogical Society board several times, and has worked on a number of transcription projects to make Dallas county records available.  Her family research activities have taken her to most of the Southern states, England and Italy.

Shout-Out to Genealogy and the Kane County (IL) Genealogical Society

There was a great article in the Geneva (IL) Republican about genealogy and its popularity.  The Kane County Genealogical Society was also highlighted in the article.  This is so wonderful to see.  And I am especially excited since I have ancestors from Kane County!

You can read the article here.

DNA and DAR

A few days ago, I caught a quick glimpse of a discussion in a Facebook group about DNA tests and DAR proofs.  I didn’t have much time to read the whole discussion, but the gist was that the DNA results were not accepted as proof, in conjunction with other documentation, all of which clearly identified the woman as a descendant.

Today, I came across an article in the Washington Post about the same topic.  Whether it was the same woman, I’m not sure, as I wasn’t able to relocate the Facebook discussion.  The debate is quite interesting…read for yourself.

New Blog

Writing Your Way to the Past is my new blog!  I’ve created this blog in conjunction with my genealogy business.  This blog contains static pages that discuss my experience and services.  The plan is to post a variety of posts including news on my business, genealogy news, and research tips and writing ideas.

Enjoy!