Thread:CorgiMom/@comment-34076922-20190201025340/@comment-29989042-20190311152839

A pajama day sounds like “good medicine” for you! Enjoy every second of it! 😊

I have been researching my family’s history since 1989, when I took my first genealogy class. My mom’s side of the family is from Holland, so I grew listening to the Dutch language and quizzed both my grandma and great-grandma on all things Holland and our family there. When I was 15, that grandma took me on a trip to Europe. We visited several countries, but the most important one was Holland, where I got to meet some of my extended family. Since then, I have researched both sides of my family. I even traveled to my other grandmother’s country with her (British Columbia and Alberta, Canada) and visited many sites, including my great-grandparent’s homestead and cemeteries. Both my grandmothers have since passed away, so I really treasure those memories of their travels. It is my Canadian grandmother’s family that I will be researching in Arkansas. Even though my grandmother was born and raised in Alberta, her father (my great-grandfather) immigrated to Alberta with his family when he was a boy. That branch of the family had been in the U.S. since about 1750, when my 5th great-grandfather immigrated here from Ireland. They lived on the east coast for almost 100 years and then started migrating west to Arkansas, where they settled in the first half of the 1800s. In 1906, Alberta, Canada opened up land for homesteading, so a big chunk of my Arkansas family packed up what they could take with them and caught a train, riding it as far north into Alberta they could and found the land that would become their homesteads. My great-grandfather eventually met and married my great-grandmother and had seven children, the oldest being my grandma. She is the only one of the seven to move to the U.S. after marrying my grandpa, (who has been a U.S. citizen living in Canada), and she became a naturalized citizen when my dad was 14 years old. Some of my Arkansas ancestors were prominent people (one served as a senator in the Arkansas state legislature), so I hope to pick up more family stories in the local archives.

Sorry my post is so long, but hopefully you’re reading it at your leisure, with your feet up, enjoying your delivered meal! So glad to hear your mom and stepdad are already doing better. Enjoy the warmer weather! 💖