A Look Back Over 6 Years of Blogging...

October 3rd is my 6 year blogiversary. Sometimes I can’t believe that it’s gone that quick, and other times, it seems forever. Anyway 6 years on, and I’m still blogging, and I still love it. For this post, I thought I’d take a little look back at some of my favourite posts. I do write on a number of different topics, so I’ve groups them into various categories, and have chosen six from each. This post took a lot longer to compile that I expected, partly because I relooked at each and every post I’d written which was a very interesting exercise, but also because it was so hard choosing which ones to include. I would have loved that list more … FAMILY HISTORY – Anzac Day Blog Challenge: He Was Proud to be Australian – Family History Through the Alphabet Challenge: P is for … Charlotte PHILLIPS – Trove Tuesday: The Saddest News of All – Diaries, and the Stories They Can Tell! – A Wedding in the Midst of War – Looking Back: Photos of My Grandmas FUNNIES – Ten, Eleven, Twelve Commandments of Genealogy – 13 Signs You Have Genealogy OCD – Favourite Family Tree Quotes – All I Want For Christmas Is A New Surname – Genealogy, As the World Sees It – Are You a Genealogist or a Family Historian? HISTORY – History Meets Street Art in Adelaide – History Under Your Feet – Australian History – the Bits You Didn’t Know About – Trove Tuesday: 1 March 1954, The Day the Earth Shook South Australia – A List of Don’ts for Women on Bicycles Circa 1895 – Australia Day, 26 January … or is it May or July? RECORDS AND RESEARCH – Australian Government Gazettes – Have You Discovered Them? – Australian Birth, Death and Marriage...

Lonetester HQ Turns 5!

Apparently time flies when you’re having fun blogging, as it was on this day (3rd October) in 2011 that I wrote my first post here on Lonetester HQ. I found re-reading that first “Hello World” post is interesting, as back then I simply knew I wanted my own genealogy blog (separate from work) , without knowing exactly what I’d write. Now 5 years and 300+ posts later … I’ve written about all sorts. About websites I’ve found and used, about programs, about books I love, about local history, events I’ve been to, genealogy cruises, social media, even me and my pets, and of course my family history. I’ve taken part in (and created) geneamemes and blog challenges, met many new geneabloggers along the way, as well as having distant family ‘discover me’ through my blog. I’ve even been nominated for some awards. Even after 5 years, I would say that my blog still doesn’t have a ‘specific’ direction other than most of it is history and genealogy orientated. And I’m fine with that. I’m not a professional researcher or writer, not every post is a “how-to” one. In fact in reality I’m more of a “I’ve done this … or found this …  and you might find it useful” writer. In otherwords writing from my experiences. Anyway I do love blogging … or maybe I should say I love writing. But blogging lets me share my stories and experiences with others in a way that simply writing them (for me) doesn’t. While I’d love had have a giveaway or something to celebrate my blogiversary with my readers, instead I thought I would help change someone’s life by making another loan through Kiva. For those who are unfamiliar with Kiva,...

Blogiversary: Three Years and Still Writing...

The 3rd of October 2011 is a date I remember. It was the day I sat down to write my first post (and second) on this Lonetester HQ blog. I remember wondering what to write about, and after my “Welcome” post, I decided to take part in Geniaus’ “So You Think You’re a Tech Savvy Genealogist” geneameme. Now 3 years, and 203 posts later, I still LOVE writing! For this post I have taken the time to browse through all my past posts, and I noticed that it has created a bit of a genealogy diary. I do tend to be rather eclectic  in my writing. I’ve written about books I’ve read, events I’ve been to, family I’m researching, the house history I worked on as well as other things I’ve found interesting along the way. I’ve taken part in geneamemes and blog challenges and have even written a tribute to one of my cats when he died. So yes, it has ended up a little diary like, and it allows me to get a feel for when I was working on at a particular time, or what events were on when and so on. I won’t make this blogiversary post long. And I won’t go into various stats or lists of favourite posts, as I have done that before. But rather I want to say to anyone who is thinking of taking up blogging, particularly geneablogging … simply “DO IT”, you won’t regret it. Not only do you get to “meet” so many other wonderful geneabloggers, and get great tips and inspiration from others, you also get to tell the amazing stories of your own family. But the best part of all is the connections you’ll make. Your blog...

Happy 1st Blogiversary to Me...

Happy 1st Blogiversary to Me, Happy 1st Blogiversary to Me, Happy 1st Blogiversary to MEEEEEEE, Happy 1st Blogiversary to Me! Now to celebrate I want to give you all a cupcake (your choice of frosting of course) … Well I really, really would if I could, but you know it kinda gets squished in the mail, so in this case you’ll have to imagine it. I do find it hard to believe that it has already been 365 days since I sat at my computer and wrote my first post here on lonetester HQ … but time (and life) seems to fly by these days … and obviously that includes geneablogging as well. So here I am a whole year later celebrating my 1st blogiversary. You know somehow I’ve managed to put my fingers to the keyboard [modern equivalent of pen to paper ;-)] a total of 43 times in the past year, kinda surprising actually (more time-wise than idea-wise), as for every post I do get published, I seem to have another 4 or more ideas. And I have found participating in the Family History Through the Alphabet challenge has given me some focus which has helped along the way. Anyway I thought this would be a good opportunity to take a look over the statistics of my posts for the past year, and here’s the five that have been looked a the most … 1. History Meets Street Art in Adelaide 2. Ten, Eleven, Twelve Commandments of Genealogy 3. Family History Through the Alphabet Challenge: D is for … Dropbox 4. Family History Through the Alphabet Challenge: L is for … Letters 5. Australian Government Gazettes – Have You Discovered Them? I would also like to say...