Do celebrities have better roots than the rest of us?

Former "Friends" star Lisa Kudrow is taking celebs back to their roots for the family tree reality series "Who Do You Think You Are?" "It's far from the E! True Hollywood Story.

We have a tendency to put celebrities on a pedestal. No show has treated stars this way before,' Dan Bucatinsky added. "Who Do You Think You Are?" is a 42-minute show with commercials, and producers are working closely with a team of historians and genealogists to trace back celebs' roots. NBC.com is working on a partnership with online genealogy powerhouse Ancestry.com to create a cross-platform interactive Web site to coincide with the launch of the series. The hope is that people will tune in because it's Sarah Jessica Parker or Susan Sarandon," Kudrow said.

New Administrative Guide for Family History available online!

The new (8-page) ADMINISTRATIVE GUIDE FOR FAMILY HISTORY is now available online from the LDS home page:
www.lds.org/pa/familyhistory/pdf/FCH_2007_05_AdminGuide_04397_eng_.pdf

It includes a list of administrative responsibilities for family history.

Also online are three family history articles:

Howard W. Hunter, "A Temple-Motivated People," Ensign, Feb. 1995, 2–5

http://www.lds.org/pa/library/0,17905,7315-1,00.html

Dennis B. Neuenschwander, "Bridges and Eternal Keepsakes," Ensign, May 1999, 83–85

http://www.lds.org/pa/library/0,17905,7316-1,00.html

Dallin H. Oaks, "Family History: 'In Wisdom and Order,'" Ensign, June 1989, 6–8.

http://www.lds.org/pa/library/0,17905,7376-1,00.html

Book signings

Hi everyone!

My twin sister and I have been out and about, doing book signings and speaking at fun genealogy conferences around the country for our book "Climbing Family Trees, Whispers In the Leaves." We'd love to meet you! To see a list of where we'll be and when we'll be there, check out www.boicebox.com/aboutus.html

Check out the new ROOTS TELEVISION!

Trina and Tracey are now co-hosts on the newly launched Roots Television! Check out the web site and be sure to see their entertaining Vlogs (video Blogs) which change daily. Go to www.rootstelevision.com and then click on "Vlogs" and then click on "Climbing Family Trees". Of course you'll want to take a peek at everything on the web site and you'll be kept mighty busy because there is a TON to see! You're gonna love it!

Eastman's Online Genealogy newsletter

Here's another great genealogy blog I thought you might enjoy:
Go to www.eogn.blog.com

Fun ways to get children involved in doing family history

1. They know that at age 12, they will need some family names to taketo the Temple to do baptisms. They have to do the research themselves and submit the disc and everything. I have conveniently forgotten totell them that the Temple will provide names if they don't have anyfamily names ready to go. Of course, they figure that out on theirfirst trip to the Temple, but by then they already know how to do it. The Fam Hist Ctr isn't open Monday nights, but we've done researchover the internet together and had "how to use PAF" lessons for FHE.

2. I've made pedigree chart puzzles. Two kinds have worked -- a regular chart laminated and cut up and also a blank chart laminatedwith the names laminated seprately (put he names in the right spaceson the chart). It's important to make one for each child - they reallylike putting their own name on the chart! Somehow it totally loses itsappeal if your sibling is person number one.

3. Family Tree shirts. We all made matching T-shirts onto which we haddrawn trees with names. I copied the basic design from a baby book and we used fabric pens (from JoAnn Fabrics).

4. We have an occassional FHE dedicated to an ancestor or ancestralfamily group. Make a timeline of their life showing their personalactivities as well as historical factoids to put it in perspective (what was going on in US history? What inventions were new?). Show asample of their handwriting. Have kids try to copy it.

5. For a long time we had a huge paper chain family tree extendingback 5 generations. Each person was either dark or light pink or blue (showing gender and whether or not individual Temple ordinances werecomplete) and each family group was linked by either a black or whitepaper link (whether or not the family had been sealed). Whenever myhusband and I went to the Temple, the kids helped us swap out links to show the progress we had made. But eventualy, all we had left were thedark and black links for living family members who were not Churchmembers. We made the original link-tree as a FHE project. It waspretty messy (you couldn't just look at it and see the relationships), but if you found one particular link you could definitely follow thechain around to see how they were related to others.

WWI Draft cards - free to search during February 2006

World War One Draft Cards database will be free to search (with registration) during February 2006. Registration requires your name and email address. To take advantage of this offer go to the webpage below and click on the WWI Draft Cards link near the top...Free Genealogy Stuff Online - Charts, Forms, Software & Online Recordshttp://www.researchguides.net/free.htm<http://www.researchguides.net/freehtm>