A Genealogy Baker's Dozen Gift Ideas

Every year I publish a Christmas Wish List for Genealogists. Here are a few of my items from last year plus a few more. Start your Genealogy Christmas shopping now and surprise your loved ones (or yourself!) with a creative Genealogy gift.

1. Ancestry.com World Subscription (or any other genealogy subscription-based site you like)

2. Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner to take to Archives, Libraries and on field trips. Read my first review from November 2010 at Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner, Best Thing Since Sliced Bread

3. RootsTech Registration. Ask your loved one to register you for RootsTech 2014 coming up February 6 - 8, 2014

4. Fujitsu ScanSnap iX500 Scanner for PC and Mac (PA03656-B005)  I recently bought one of these and I am loving it! It's a wireless document feeder scanner. I can scan up to 25 items at once and they appear automatically on my computer in one file (or in Evernote or Dropbox or many other choices!)

5. Evernote Moleskine notebook. I don't have one and am pretty anxious to try it out! Apparently you write in the notebook and with a click of your smartphone camera, can transfer your notes to Evernote. See The New Evernote Smart Notebook by Moleskine

6. DNA Test Kit from Family Tree DNA (or any other DNA Testing company you prefer)
 
7.  Livescribe 8 GB Echo Smartpen for recording Family Stories and Memories. I love my SmartPen. I use it to record my 89 year old auntie's stories of her childhood, then I plug it into my laptop and the digital record transfers. Using the pen while auntie speaks, I make jot notes in the special notebooks. Then I can play the recorded stories by touching any word in the notebook. Very cool!

8. Don't miss out on this great opportunity. Byron Rempel of IDrawZombies.com can turn a photograph of you (or anyone else) into a zombie portrait. Rempel has been featured in Undead and Loving It in The National Post for his Art project 1000 Zombies. You can also obtain his Zombie Colouring Book to release your inner artist. The cost for the colouring book "Scrapbook of the Dead" is whatever you decide to pay - how cool is that?

9.  A subscription to the Genealogy Magazine of your choice. I'd like Family Tree Magazine, but the one you drool over could be very different

10. Jawbone JAMBOX This tiny powerful speaker allows you to connect via bluetooth to any other bluetooth enabled device (laptop, computer, iPhone, iPad etc) and play your favourite podcasts or listen to any audio with much better quality sound. I have one and I love it.

11. A beautiful journal for writing your own memoirs. I love Iona Handcrafted Books and have asked my hubby to buy me another one this Christmas as I'm on my last one. Tip: If the checkout won't accept a non-USA order, just email or phone as they do accept international orders.

12.  A Shutterfly gift certificate  I love Shutterfly for creating family photo books or calendars. It's also great for simply getting copies of your family photos so you can share them with family members

13. And in blatant self-promotion, how about asking for one of the genealogy and history books I have written and published?

Credits: "Santa Pushing Gift Bag" by digitalart on FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Scanning Auntie's Life Story Pages with Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner

Using LiveScribe to Record Auntie's Memories

Here's another way I got to use my Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner with Auntie. We usually chat and drink tea while I scan her box of photos.

This time I recorded some of her memories using my LiveScribe Pen and then I used my Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner to scan the start of her life story she'd written out on loose pages.

You can see the pages she'd written sitting on the coffee table waiting to be scanned. The stitching software with Flip-Pal allowed me to easily scan the pages in sections then stitch them together seamlessly when I got home.

All I did was transfer the scanned sections to my computer and let the stitching software do the work putting them together in one seamless page after the other.

Journal for Auntie's Memorie

I also bought a small journal for Auntie to write down more life stories as she thinks of them. I'm looking forward to visiting again to see what else she's remembered. I'll take my Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner with me of course to scan any memories she has done. 

Scanning Auntie's Photos with Flip-Pal

If you don't have one of these amazing scanners yet there's a good deal right now that might interest you.

Use Promotion Code: FPDC412A

Coupon is good from April 18 – 29

Offer: Save $20 when you purchase a Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner plus a Deluxe Flip-Pal mobile scanner Carry Case with Pocket! (Both items must be in your shopping cart!) Use this link Flip-Pal Mobile Scannerto make your purchase

Echo Smart Pen: Handy Tool for Genealogists

Echo Smart Pen

This is my new Livescribe 8 GB Echo Smartpen which I bought from Amazon.com

I've been looking at them for over a year and finally took the plunge to buy one last month.

The Echo Smart Pen allows me to record anything I want from my pen to special notebooks, and then transfer the recordings to my computer.

Special Noteboo

How great would that be at a family reunion? I could go from person to person and record a few minutes of their thoughts on the reunion, or their memories of past reunions, or I could ask them to give one memory of their childhood.  Then it would be a simple matter to transfer the recordings to my computer, turn them into text and create booklets for the next family reunion!

I can also visit my 88 year old auntie and have her reminisce about the past while my pen is recording and I make quick jot notes in the special notebooks.

The notebooks have controls at the bottom of the pages. You press on Start with your pen to begin recording and Stop when you are done. There are other controls - pause, rewind, scroll ahead for example. You can fast forward and do other functions directly in the notebook.

The jot notes are great because while you are recording the person, you make point form or jot notes. Then you can touch your pen to any point in your jot notes to replay just that portion of the recording.

I bought a set of 4 notebooks and my SmartPen came with one so I'm pretty set for recording family histories. For a limited time a purchase of the 8GB SmartPen also includes a one year premium subscription to Evernote  I already use the free version daily so I'm a happy camper)

Next week I will be visiting my auntie to start recording her memories. I'm really excited! 

Here's what came in the box:

• The Echo smartpen with 8GB of memory
• Livescribe Connect Premium: Includes Connect Basic (Facebook, Evernote, MyLivescribe, your mobile device, and your computer) plus additional connectors for Email and Google Docs
• Livescribe Desktop software for Mac or Windows (download)
• 500 MB of personal online storage
• Starter dot paper notebook
• Micro USB Cable
• Interactive Getting Started Guide
• Smartpen Tips and Tricks
• 2 smartpen caps
• 2 ink cartridges

 If you don't think you need anything as big as the 8GB, there is also the Livescribe 2 GB Echo Smartpen Starter Pack or the Livescribe 4 GB Echo Smartpen  available.