If you send off for records be prepared to wait. Find other things to do while you wait.
Just because you are waiting for a death certificate does not mean that you can’t be doing other research ,or organizing records, or going for a walk.
Daily life doesn’t stop while we wait. Down-size your possessions and streamline your records now while you are healthy so your family isn’t left with the mess when you are gone.
Periodically review your own research as well as verify everything you get from other researchers. If they don’t have citations, don’t consider it official until you look into it yourself. This is especially true of online genealogy sites. Each person who uploads information is on the honor system that they have verified it and have it well documented. All too many people just copy and merge online information into their genealogy program without verifying that it is really their family and is quality research.
You will need one if you go tromping through cemeteries and travel around to different courthouses and libraries and other record repositories. A good pair of boots for getting in the mud is helpful too.
Being a genealogist is about both musty records and getting out in the woods. Imagine yourself as Indiana Jones of the genealogy world.
The need to go through old overgrown cemeteries or just walking through large cemeteries without easy road access is another reason to stay in shape. Staying in shape also helps the brain do a better job of thinking and making connections in your research.
It takes time. Time can be your enemy if you are new to genealogy and you find that you are your oldest known living relative and don’t remember all the boring stories your family used to talk about when you were a kid. Time can be your friend if you are organized and plan for the long haul and are persistent.
Whether pen and paper, electronic document or spreadsheet, or Genealogy program, have a system to your research.
The system you use will help you to organize, file, and retrieve information as needed.
The longer you do research the more often you will get requests from distant cousins or possibly distant cousins, or distant in-laws on a certain group or family or person. The better your system the better you can answer these queries.
Genealogical research has a lot in common with doing a research paper for high school or college. You need to know how to locate information and they best types of records and information and where to locate them. In the old days you had to travel to the location of the county where your ancestors were. In the age of the internet, this is not needed as much, but even with all the information online, you may still need to visit a courthouse or a library with genealogical holdings. Knowing what you are looking for before you make a research trip will speed your research.
Your end product is only as good as the effort you put into it.
If you don’t follow up on other’s research and just import a GEDCOM into your database, you end up with a mess that no one can follow.
I knew someone who said that they just imported every GEDCOM they found online with a name they were researching hoping to make a breakthrough. Hundreds of unverified GEDCOMS imported into your live genealogy database just makes a mess that will never get resolved.
It is best when you start out to only put things into your genealogy database that you have verified, or have very good information on them. Obviously people you personally know in your family, you can put in. People your parents and so forth personally knew you can put in, but be sure to back the information up by finding them in censuses, tax records, and other records.
The better job you do, the person who inherits your research will be very glad.
Persistence is a must. You will hit your brick wall and may be stuck for years. Keep at it. You may need to set it aside for a time, but after a break return to the search and look at it fresh.
Is there a new angle or approach you haven’t tried?
There are lots of genealogy bloggers who write about such things, seek out their ideas. There are also books on the subject.
You may not be the one to break down the wall. If that’s the case, document your efforts so that whoever inherits your work can pick up and be the one to make the breakthrough.
Find what works for you.
It can be a binder and folder system if you prefer to work in paper only.
It can be a computer only system if you have a way to scan and organize all your information. This absolutely requires a fail proof backup system of all your information.
Most people will have a combination of computer and paper. Some things like family letters and pictures should be scanned, but also keep the originals as they are priceless.
Whatever your system, you should be able to both find and file away new information. Any information filed should be easily retrievable and the filing system should support that.
There is no one right way to do it. The best system is one that works for you and that your children or whoever inherits your research can easily pick up where you left off.
Note taking in genealogical research serves multiple purposes.
All of the notes we take must be clear and to the point and must be legible when we return to them at some point in the future.
I have a terrible habit from years of note-taking in college and grad school of writing so fast that I can’t read it later. That’s why doctors have such bad handwriting. They have muscle memory of writing that way and it is too easy to keep at it. It takes conscious effort to unlearn that. The advent of easy access to computers has kept me from overcoming that issue.