Resource Wednesday Writing Prompt and Dragon Naturally Speaking

Here’s Family Tree Gal’s RESOURCE WEDNESDAY writing prompt and Resource of the Week: Dragon Naturally Speaking 11 - voice recognition software.

WRITING PROMPT:

Each Wednesday, tell about a resource (software, personal interviews, notebooks, filing system, webinar, book, website, etc.) you are using to meet your personal growth/ genealogy/ or family history goals.  What are the strong points of the resource?  What are your challenges while using it?  In general, would you recommend it to others?

In an effort to help each other, please include your advice in the comment section below and comment on Family Tree Gal’s Facebook page.  Note:  Twitter hashtag for Resource Wednesday= #rwed

MY RESOURCE OF THE WEEK:  Dragon Naturally Speaking 11

This is wild!  Dragon Naturally Speaking 11- voice recognition software  (Check out all their editions)

I intend to use this to help me write my personal history or tell stories about my ancestors.

I loved the Home Edition and am now experimenting with the Premium edition which is supposed to work with a digital voice recorder.  It types as you talk into a headset with a microphone.  It works 3x as fast as regular typing.  I love it.

There is a “learning curve”.  You must say “period” for it to type a period, etc.  The software also trains itself to your voice, so, at first, you must make corrections to what it types.  The more you stick with it, the less mistakes it makes.  It made me laugh when I first saw it type while I talked.  I wanted to show everyone in the house!

Some people don’t want to stick through this learning process, and it bothers them.  Me, I think it’s wonderful and worth it--even when I make some corrections.  I am glad to have Dragon Natrually Speaking 11- Premium Edition.  I’m excited to see how it works with a digital voice recorder.

Click the banner below to learn more about Dragon.
Check out all their editions on the left sidebar of their site.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”  As founder of Family Tree Quest [dot] com, I am an affiliate of Nuance—makers of Dragon Naturally Speaking 11.  Because of my affiliation, I was sent copies to review.

Memory Lane Monday: Water

morguefile photo

I’m using the ’52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History’ series authored by Amy Coffin as an aid in starting my personal history throughout the year.  See the entire challenge on my Examiner.com article. I want to leave my OWN story in my own words so my posterity will be able to know me a little better. Perhaps you’d like to do the same.

Here is the beginning of my memories about WATER:

I grew up in Long Beach, CA near the Pacific Ocean.  As a teen, Cherry Beach was five minutes away from home and a favorite place to go to get tan, or try to get tan.  A group of my friends would drive down in our Chevrolet Caprice Classic or my best friends’ families light blue Volkswagon “Bug”.

The Long Beach pier was beautiful to view at night due to the lights lining it.  The oil rigs in the distance were pleasantly disguised and lit with colored lights, as well. 

When I was young, The Pike (an amusement park) was a festive place to spend time.  It was located right by the ocean.  My dad would take me there—sometimes with a friend.  The ferris wheel and merry-go-round were main attractions.  I also remember the mirrors that would distort my image when I would stand in front of them.  It was at the Pike that I developed my love for cotton candy.  I loved feeding the seals, although I couldn’t stand their smell. 

In 1967, the Queen Mary became quite an attraction in the port of Long Beach, and was a welcomed addition to the shoreline.  Ports ‘O Call and Seaport Village with their shops and restaurants were also interesting places to spend time. . . and money. 

It was a pleasure to live a few minutes away from the ocean, feel the sea breeze, and call Long Beach my home.
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As founder of Family Tree Quest, people sometimes ask what tools I recommend for organizing and recording personal and family history.  Here are my highest recommendations.

Heritage Collector Suite-  Your complete Family History Management System  (my highest recommendation)
This has everything you need to get your family history clutter into one, orderly place.  Store and retrieve photos, documents, videos, etc.  Create a PDF for a bound book.  Many bonus items such as storybook and GPS modules.

Personal Historian Software- I love it’s timelines and personal history prompts. 

Flip-Pal™ mobile scanner –  Portable, easy flip-and-scan-technology.  You can even scan pictures in the frame or while they remain in their photo albums!  I sit on the sofa in comfort and scan to my hearts delight.
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As the Phoenix Genealogy Examiner, I create an article about this series each Monday.  Click subscribe (at the top) if you’d like to get my articles automatically delivered to your email inbox, or click the RSS icon to read my posts via a feed reader.  These weekly challenges are authored by Amy Coffin of the We Tree blog and hosted on the GeneaBloggers website.

Please leave a comment and let me know YOU stopped by for a visit to my blog.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.” I have not received any compensation from Amy Coffin or GeneaBloggers.com for writing this post. I am listed on the GeneaBloggers Blog Roll because I find it to be a valuable, shared community resource. As founder of Family Tree Quest [dot] com, I am an affiliate of LifeStory Productions, Inc. Flip-pal and Amazon [dot] com.

Family Tree Friday

Reminder:  Have you framed your family tree to help you remember your dynamic and meaningful place in your family line?

I hope you will use our daily prompts for your own written or computer records or in your own posts for blogs, Facebook, Tweets etc. as well as read them here. This is an ideal way to add to your personal or family history on a weekly basis and to keep your efforts toward creating positive change going.  [The Twitter hashtag for Family Tree Friday is #famtf]

Here is the Family Tree Friday prompt:

Write about the important lessons in life have you learned that you’d like to pass forward to other family members or posterity, and how (specifically) are you passing it on? (personal time together, positive words, written family stories, journal keeping, etc.) (This fits the third goal found at www.familytreequest.com, "Preparing Confidently for the Future")

To find the prompts for the other days of the week, click on the tab titled “Daily Prompts” underneath the “Welcome” message at the top of my blog.

The daily prompts are designed to:

1)  Give continuity to Family History and Personal Progress goals each week.

2)  Unite Generational ChangeMakers (those who are just beginning to make positive generational change) with the genealogy/family history community (who have vast resources of knowledge and experience)--thus strengthening ALL family trees.

3) Emphasize the goals of Family Tree Quest which are:

     a)  Glean Wisdom from the Past
     b)  Live Mindfully in the Present
     c)  Prepare Confidently for the Future

We are striving to strengthen lives in THIS generation, thus strengthening our family trees for years to come.  Please consider Joining the Quest if you haven’t already.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  The above links will connect you to my website. If you are someone who wishes to create positive change in THIS generation to strengthen your family tree, I invite you to JOIN THE QUEST and become a "Generational Change-maker" by filling out the form at the bottom of the home page on my website.

Memory Lane Monday: Summer

I’m using the ’52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History’ series authored by Amy Coffin as an aid in starting my personal history throughout the year.  See the entire challenge on my Examiner.com article.  I want to leave my OWN story in my own words so my posterity will be able to know me a little better. Perhaps you’d like to do the same.

Here is the beginning of my memories about SUMMER.

Summer in Long Beach was pleasant due to the weather and time out of school.  As a child, I would play with my friends at home or at my best friend’s house.  We had a large backyard, so baseball was a favorite outdoor game.  I wanted to be a teacher when I grew up, so we would use the 4-foot stems from a plant my dad grew, and pretend to be classroom teachers and use the stems as pointers to point to words on our pretend chalkboards. On the patio or in the house we would play with dolls.  My friend wanted to be a nurse when she grew up, so sometimes we would play “nurse”. At my best friend’s house, we would climb the back fence or play cowboys and Indians or kickball on her driveway.  She had a swing set, so sometimes we would swing.

As a teen, I liked to hang out with my girlfriends.  We would often be at each others houses or at the beach.  When I began dating, I spent a lot of time with my boyfriend.

Family vacations to see our relatives in Utah were a fun get-away and were something I could count on each summer. 

Our summers were fairly low-key, relaxing, enjoyable times.
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As founder of Family Tree Quest, people sometimes ask what tools I recommend for organizing and recording personal and family history.  Here are my highest recommendations.

Heritage Collector Suite-  Your complete Family History Management System  (my highest recommendation)
This has everything you need to get your family history clutter into one, orderly place.  Store and retrieve photos, documents, videos, etc.  Create a PDF for a bound book.  Many bonus items such as storybook and GPS modules.

Personal Historian Software-  I love it’s timelines and personal history prompts. 

Flip-Pal™ mobile scanner –   Portable, easy flip-and-scan-technology.  You can even scan pictures in the frame or while they remain in their photo albums!  I sit on the sofa in comfort and scan to my hearts delight.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

As the Phoenix Genealogy Examiner, I create an article about this series each Monday.  Click subscribe (at the top) if you’d like to get my articles automatically delivered to your email inbox, or click the RSS icon to read my posts via a feed reader.  These weekly challenges are authored by Amy Coffin of the We Tree blog and hosted on the GeneaBloggers website.

Please leave a comment and let me know YOU stopped by for a visit to my blog.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.” I have not received any compensation from Amy Coffin or GeneaBloggers.com for writing this post. I am listed on the GeneaBloggers Blog Roll because I find it to be a valuable, shared community resource. As founder of Family Tree Quest [dot] com, I am an affiliate of LifeStory Productions, Inc. Flip-pal and Amazon [dot] com.

Memory Lane Monday: VACATIONS

I’m using the ’52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History’ series as an aid in beginning my personal history this year.  See the entire challenge on my Examiner.com article at http://exm.nr/jX6wSe. I create an article about this series each Monday.  Click subscribe (at the top) if you’d like to get my articles automatically delivered to your email inbox, or click the RSS icon to read my posts via a feed reader.  These weekly challenges are authored by Amy Coffin of the We Tree blog and hosted on the GeneaBloggers website

Here is the beginning of my memories about VACATIONS:

I had  very few relatives that lived in California near us, so summer time usually involved visiting our family in Utah.  My father’s parents and brother and most of his sisters lived in or near Salt Lake City (Grandpa died when I was in my teens.)  My mother’s family was from Santaquin, and many of our relatives lived in or near there. (My grandpa died when I was three and Grandma when I was ten.) 

On the long trips, my parents and I would sing songs and listen to the radio when the mountains did not interfere with the reception.  We always packed apples, cheese and Ritz crackers for snacks.  Now that they are no longer living, I have fond memories renewed each time I see the paring knife we took on those trips to cut the block of cheese.  Just last night I was thinking about staying on the first floor of some hotels back then and hearing the creeks from the floor above.  My parents were light sleepers, and the noise would wake them up—even though, for those times, we stayed in nice hotels.

In Santaquin, I can remember the smell of farms and sitting on the big porch outside my Aunt Eva’s house.  I also remember my grandmother sitting in Eva’s living room.  In Salt Lake, the first thing my Grandma would do is call all the family members near us, and they would come immediately to visit.  Grandma would bring out all sorts of fruits she had bottled, including peaches and tomatoes.  We would have sliced bread and butter and a hodgepodge of homemade, yummy, yet simple foods.

A few summers, we went to what was called Family Camp in the High Sierra mountains.  Lots of families from our church would vacation there—from our congregation and others of the same denomination.  I was quite shy, so this was hard for me to be with so many other families and youth.  Yet one of my best friends came with her family and we had a blast!  I loved going to Shaver Lake and being out in nature.  There were crafts and games during the day.  We had lunch together in one big assembly hall. At night, there would be a huge gathering with skits or some kind of presentation.  On the porch of our cabin, there was singing, watching the stars and talking together.  My dad played the harmonica. Except for the Daddy-long-legs and mosquitoes, it was lots of fun. 

We did tour different sites and keep busy seeing “things”, but, as usual, I’m noticing it’s the connections in relationships that count. I loved our family vacations.  It’s a blessing to have fond memories with my parents, extended family and dear friends.  Feel free to tell us about your favorite memory of vacations in the comment section.
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Do you ever fit your family history goals into your vacations?  Seeing relatives provides a marvelous opportunity for family history interviews, sharing photos, and peaking interest in your family line.  There are a couple products I highly recommend:

Flip-PalMobile Scanner-  Take your scanner on trips with this netbook-sized portable scanner.  No computer needed in order to scan.  The Flip-pal can scan pictures while they are still in the frames and is great when it comes to scanning pictures which are still in the photo albums of the relatives you visit.  Visit their site to see all it’s incredible features.  (Great for summer craft projects, too.)  See my Flip-Pal mobile scanner 5-star review by clicking here. 

Pocket Tree-The carry-with-you family tree.  9+ Generation Ancestry Chart fits in your pocket or purse.   Includes handy interview questions for writing life stories of your relatives (and more).  Great for family vacations and reunions. See my Pocket Tree 5-star review by clicking here.  

Investigate these two amazing products today.

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As founder of Family Tree Quest, people sometimes ask what tools I recommend for organizing and recording personal and family history.  Here are my highest recommendations.

Heritage Collector Suite-  Your complete Family History Management System  (my highest recommendation)
This has everything you need to get your family history clutter into one, orderly place.  Store and retrieve photos, documents, videos, etc.  Create a PDF for a bound book.  Many bonus items such as storybook and GPS modules.

Personal Historian Software-  I love it’s timelines and personal history prompts. 

I hope you feel free to leave a comment today.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.” I have not received any compensation from Amy Coffin or GeneaBloggers.com for writing this post. I am listed on the GeneaBloggers Blog Roll because I find it to be a valuable, shared community resource. As founder of Family Tree Quest [dot] com, I am an affiliate of LifeStory Productions, Inc. Flip-pal, Pocket Tree and Amazon [dot] com.