Fortunately, there are a couple services that will let blog owners print a book from the material and pictures hosted on blogs.

Blog2Print

One site is called Blog2Print which uses your blog login information to access your blog posts and pictures.  You can then organize the blog posts, pictures, etc. and create your book.

I’m not a fan of letting other websites have access to login information from different accounts, so my suggestion is to change your blog password before and then after you use the service.

Pricing for Blog2Print is about what you’d expect for self-created picture book.  If your blog has hundreds and hundreds of posts that you think will probably fill up a number of printed books at large cost, you could try their feature of priting to a PDF.  You could then take the PDF and have it printed somewhere else.

Blog2Print Website

Blurb BookSmart

With BookSmart by Blurb you download software to your computer that helps you organize the information from you blog.  You can then create your book.  Pricing is pretty good with this option, but you will need to install the software on your computer.

If you have a lot of posts which would equate to a lot of pages which in turn would mean more costly a book, try creating your book with the Black and White option.  The prices are much lower compared to the color books.  Save color for your printed photos if you’re planning to use your blog and print it as a journal.

BookSmart really does provide a rather wonderful selection of book types and pricing options which makes their service quite competitive.

Blurb Website

Other Book Printing Websites

There are other websites that you can use to print books but that don’t have the integration to pull information from your blog in an integrated and easy way (that we could find at least):

Lulu (a great service)

Lulu is a major printer/publisher.  If you have your book ready, Lulu can print your book, allow you to sell it from their or your own website.  Another great thing about Lulu is that you can start by purchasing just one copy of your book, but if you want more copies later, they can print it up.  It’s print on demand.

Lulu Website

MyPublisher

MyPublisher is used often for photo books.  You can receive discounts for MyPublisher by searching for MyPublisher Coupons on the Internet.  If you have a Costco membership, you might be able to get a discount as well (at least you could in the past from the Costco website).

MyPublisher Website

BookSurge by Amazon

BookSurge is similar to Lulu but integrates very well with Amazon.com if you are looking to sell your book/journal online (maybe you’re a movie star and lots of people want to read it or something).

BookSurge Website

No matter which option you choose, be selective of the types of posts you put into your book.  If your blog features more pictures of your cat than it does of you or your family, your family might not get as big of a kick out of reading the book.  So, keep the content interesting and original, and you’ll have a great book!

There are a few simple tips when taking pictures of family members to keep in a family history book or file.

Photo Tip #1: Zoom In

Your pictures will look ten times better if you zoom in or get closer to the person you are photographing. By taking a picture that encapsulates your subject head-to-toe, you lose a lot of facial detail and expression. If your subject is not a body builder or super model, they’ll probably appreciate a facial portrait rather than a full body shot.

Full shots are great, and you’ll definitely want some in your collection, but for family history purposes, you’ll probably want to capture more the essence and expression of your family member/subject.

For instance, the photo below is a great artistic photo. It makes good use of “depth of field” and is a fun composition with the flowers and the family holding hands.

It’s a great photo, no doubt about it. However, if you take a look at the picture below, you’ll see why zooming in or moving in closer to your subject greatly enhances the picture. There’s no fancy foreground or background in the picture (there’s actually no background), but you can really get a sense for the people in the picture.

Your pictures will instantly look better if you just move in a little closer. You’ll also avoid the “I-feel-uncomfortable-standing-in-front-of-the-camera-and-I -don’t-know-what-to-do-with-my-arms-syndrome.” How many times have you posed for a picture and just felt uncomfortable the way you were standing? You just didn’t feel natural and didn’t know what to do with your arms…at the side, folded, hands in pockets, etc. (One way to avoid this is to put weight on one foot and not equally on both.)

Photo Tip #2: Get Good Light

Too bright, and your pictures will be washed out, too dark, and you won’t be able to see anything–lighting is key to taking a good picture. Taking pictures outside in the morning and evening hours provides good natural light. Taking pictures at noon and early afternoon makes lots of unhappy squinters. Go for soft, natural light. If you have to take pictures during the day, try placing your subject in the shade.

Try different angles. The light can come from the side. If you have a removable or adjustable flash, try bouncing the flash off the ceiling or from the side. This will help eliminate harsh shadows behind the subject.

Photo Tip #3: Compose In 3rds

You don’t always have to place your subject smack-dab in the center of the picture. Put them to the right or left side of the frame. It will ad variety and a different dynamic into the picture.

Photo Tip #4: Small Group Shots

If you’re taking pictures of a group, you normally have to scoot way back to fit everyone into the frame. That’s fine for a single shot, but try taking pictures in smaller groups and zooming in on the faces of the individuals (see tip #1). If it’s a family picture, take the group shot, and then split the group up by taking a picture of the parents with each child. You’ll also want a picture of just the parents alone and each child alone. It’s great to have sister, uncle, brother, cousin, etc. in the pictures, but a few generations down the road, descendants will be mostly interested in the individual they are most closely related to.

Since digital pictures really don’t cost anything (unless you print them), go ahead and take a bunch. Your posterity will thank you.

That should be enough to get you started, but once you have your pictures, remember to organize them and name them.

Not only the travel we take, but the places and reasons for visiting those places affects us as well and can reveal much about ourselves.

If you’re lucky enough to have access to your family’s journals and personal histories, you may discover wonderful details about family, personal, religious, political, or business trips that your ancestors undertook.

Reflect on the times that your ancestor lived in. Today, a trip to New Zealand or Hawaii can be as easy as hoping on a plane, but did you have an ancestor that made the trip 100 years ago on a crowded ship? Why did your ancestor make the trip? Did he or she go alone? What does the trip tell about the times he or she lived in? What was the specific mode of travel and how long did the trip take? If you have ancestors that fought in wars away from home, document the places that they were stationed. You might be surprised at how “well traveled” you ancestors were.

Your Travel - If you do not have access to much information about trips your ancestors took, try creating a log of the places you’ve visited, the reason why you visited each location, and what you did. Write down what you learned from each location. Perhaps you gained a new insight into what it means to be poor or to be rich. Perhaps you met a very friendly people and culture that impressed you.

Write about why you selected the place to visit. Perhaps you wanted to “get away” from it all, or you may have been going on a tour of historic locations.

Write it Down – Take a moment to jot down the places you’ve visited and what you gained from the experience, then start working your way through your family tree to discover places your ancestors have traveled. Jot down the ideas or even map them using Google Earth or Google Maps. Place copies of the pictures, if you have them, in the history to help make the locations come to life.

If you’ve every gone through pictures of your deceased ancestors of places that they’ve traveled but the pictures were not labeled in some way, it can be very difficult if not impossible to find out where the location of the picture was taken and the reason for the trip, so you can do your future generations a favor by jotting down where you traveled and including it with your pictures.

Putting it Together - There are many ways to gain insights into your ancestors’ lives. The amount of time an effort it takes to put together a major journey, the motivations, hopes and dreams related to the trip can reveal much about the person you are researching. Tying trips generations after generation can give you a window to the times and just how much travel has changed.

Select an ancestor and learn about the times in which he or she lived. Research customs and find out about the work he or she performed. Incorporate what you learn into your “Ancestor Day.” It might be a nice touch to select a day of importance related to your ancestor as well (birthday or marriage day anniversary) as the day you select.

Timing - Wake up when you ancestor would and go to bed when they would. If your ancestor was a farmer, get up early. If your ancestor lived in a time without electricity, he or she probably retired early.

Activities – Find out what your ancestor would have done during the day and incorporate what they would have done into yours. If your ancestors were farmers, go tour a local farm or work out in your own garden. If they were miners, go see a mine or go hiking looking for rocks, etc.

Technology - If your ancestors you’re focusing on lived without electricity, turn it off for yourself for the day. No computers, PDA’s, phones, television, radio, ipods, lighting, and alarm clocks. If they had no heating, you guessed it, get out the blankets.

Transportation – Try going a day without your cars if you’re focusing on ancestors that had no cars. If public transportation was around back then, use only that. If not, try walking. Your ancestors did, everywhere they went if they didn’t have cars, horses, or other forms of transportation.

Food and Water – If hot water wasn’t around, you guessed it, go without hot water. If running water wasn’t around, take buckets and fill them the night before. Research and prepare meals from your ancestors’ time and location.

Assign tasks for each family member so they feel a part of what’s going on and have some control over the events of the day (much more likely to get participation from the young ones this way).

At the end of the day (by candlelight if the case may be) review a little about the lives of your ancestors and the struggles they had.

Wikipedia isn’t only for definitions about things, but is a great place to find information about people. First, though, a little bit about what a wiki is all about.

Wiki - A wiki is a type of webpage or website that let’s visitors quickly edit and contribute to the content on the site. For example, if you were visiting a webpage and saw a typo on the page, a wiki site would let you, yes you, edit the and correct the error without knowing how to code HTML. Most wikis will have an “edit” link for the page you’re viewing and don’t require you to create any type of account to edit the page.

How can a wiki be useful? We’ll if you’re building an encyclopedia, there are a lot of subjects that could be included but just can’t because of staffing and physical limitations. If your staff consists of the whole world, then you can include almost any subject. You can search for people, surnames, places, dates, events, items, etc. and find answers.

Articles about Individuals – Wikipedia has many thousands of pages dedicated to information about individuals (some famous, and some not so famous).

You Can Share – You can add articles to Wikipedia about your ancestors. You’ll need to follow the guidelines set up by Wikipedia for contributing quality articles. Wikipedia doesn’t want you posting articles about yourself, but if you have an ancestor you think should be included, write your article and publish it. The worst that can happen is that it gets removed, but if you’ve done your homework and written the article to wikipedia’s standards, you shouldn’t have any trouble.

Sources – What Wikipedia wants is good sources (published sources) or else your article may be removed. Just FYI.

Getting Started – There are a few steps that can help you get started and speed up the learning curve with writing an article for Wikipedia. Guidelines from Wikipedia are helpful so check those out. Below are a few quick additional tips:

1. Select an ancestor for which you have good information (good sources too) so you can contribute an article that will be valuable to others.
2. Search Wikipedia to see if an article already exists for your ancestor. (You might be surprised I found one already written for one of my ancestors). If an article already exists, you can contribute to it with information you have by clicking the “edit this page” link at the top of the article.
3. If you search for your ancestor’s name and no articles appear, click on the link which allows you to create an article yourself.
4. Start writing your article and save it and it will be published.

To make sure you have the conventional formatting correct, find an article about another person and click “edit this page” and view how the article is formatted, that will really help you in creating your own article.

Other Wikis – Wikipedia is by far the top of the wiki reference sites, but there are a few (albeit, much much smaller) wikis that focus on genealogy information.

Werelate.org – Which stands for “We Relate” not “We’re Late” touts itself as the largest genealogy wiki out there. It’s free and has a lot features. Create wiki pages about your ancestors, places, tips, etc., and link information into a family tree you create.

Others you might want to check out but don’t seem as large at the moment as werelate.org are:

• genealogy.wikia.com
• wikitree.org
• en.rodovid.org

Starting Your Own Wiki - If you want to start you’re own wiki and have some experience with setting up websites, you can use http://www.mediawiki.org which is the software behind the major wikis. You can download and use it for free.

Why do we collect things?  Is it because they remind us about the past, is it a passion for the collectible, or is it because we have a tendency to save what we like?

Whatever the underlying reasons, most people usually collect something at even the most basic levels.

Some people (pack rats) like to save everything, while others have a few very focused collections.

Finding out what others collect can be very insightful into discovering personality nuances.

My grandmother for example loves to collect mice decorations (we’re not talking real mice here, but the cute little plastic and porcelain ones).  She has little mice dolls and figurines (large and small) in different poses and apparel throughout the house.  She signs her name with a little mouse design next to the side and has done so for years.  We could always recognize a letter from Grandma when we were young because of the unique signature.

Has the desire to collect mice statues been passed down to the rest of the family?  Not that I’m aware of, but my mother collects honey bee decorations and displays them throughout the decor of the house.

Me, I’m more of a pack rat, I just save everything I’ve ever owned (at least I try to save it for as long as I can).

Take a moment to jot down things you collect.  You could also write about the fun things that your ancestors have collected and if the collection was passed on or the desire to collect those things was passed on.

To give you a few ideas about what some people collect, see the list below:

• Stamps
• Coins
• Rocks
• Cars
• Toys
• Hats, shoes, apparel
• Newspapers and magazines
• Books
• Poems, quotes, and short stories
• Furniture
• Holiday decorations
• Movies
• Family history information
• Pictures, posters, and trading cards
• License plates
• Musical Instruments
• Paintings
• Clocks and watches
• Jewelry
• Music
• Flags
• Bottles
• Key chains
• Sports paraphernalia
• Sea shells
• Sand from different places
• Dolls
• Stickers
• Recipes
• Insects
• Tickets (sports, transportation, entertainment)

As you write about collections that you have or family members have possessed, you can note if you’re a Bibliophilist (book collector), plangonologist (doll collector), or numismatist (coin/money collector).  For a list of other collector names, visit http://www.pubquizhelp.34sp.com/misc/collect.html

Passing on information about what you or your ancestors have collected provides a unique insight into the personality.  Collections change over time.  Perhaps as a youth, you collected anything and everything that had to do with a certain movie or celebrity.  Now that you’re older, you might be a bibliophilist or a receptarist (collector of recipes).

Take a moment to jot down in your personal history what you’ve collected over the years and why you enjoy collecting the items.

Find out from family members what they like to collect.  Ask around to find out what your ancestors used to collect.  What they collect will probably tell a lot about the times and conditions in which the family lived.  You might find that an ancestor had a collection of two hand-made dolls.  Remember, a collection doesn’t have to be large to be a treasure to a family member.

Why do we collect so much stuff?  It can be a deep question.  Try to find out the answer for yourself and your ancestors.  You’ll learn a lot and have fun along the way.

Now, those things can all be done and preserved online. The benefit is that family members and friends all around the globe can contribute to your project to honor your friend or family member and they don’t have to buy an expensive plane ticket.

But how to create an online tribute? There are definitely many available options. Below are listed some popular and easy ways to create a tribute to celebrate and share a life.

1. Use a “tribute” web service. Obviously, if you want to create a tribute online, you can use a web service geared towards making tributes. A great new resource to use is Tribbit.com which lets you collaborate with family members and friends to upload pictures, video, and even record voice messages for your honoree. Tribbit is free (which is another reason why we like it compared to other options), and it’s easy to use. Below is a short demo video of the Tribbit service:

   Tribbit is fun and easy to use option for creating a tribute. Tribbit.com – Create online celebrations of people, events, or things you love. Free!
   

2. Create a life time line. Another great option is to create a time line of the life of the person you’re honoring through Ourstory.com. OurStory lets you create a visual time line with pictures and stories that visitors can “scroll” across to see different events in the life of the person you a celebrating. Below is a demo video of OurStory.com:

   If you’re going to create a tribute highlighting the events in a person’s life, Ourstory is a great option, and it’s free.Capture, Share and Preserve Your Family’s Stories on OurStory.com

3. Create a website or blog. You can create a website that displays pictures and video. If you feel you’re not “technical” enough to create your own website, don’t worry; there are many services out there that will do the hard work for you for free. All you do is add pictures and content. WordPress.com is a favorite that offers a lot of flexibility but also is very powerful. The advantage of creating your own website, is that you’ll have much more flexibility with what you want to create.
4. Send one of those e-cards. Remember the days when it seemed like everyone sent ecards for birthdays and special occasions? Well, those ecards are still around and have improved quite a bit to include video and pictures that you provide. You can also use the greetings a stand alone webpages instead of just an email greeting card message. Smilebox.com offers online scrapbooks, slide shows, ecards, photo books, and postcards. Add music and video to your tribute. Use the service for free. Choose from ready-made templates and layouts to create your presentation. Free slideshows on Smilebox include your photos and videos, plus your own music.

A lot of fun options are out there to create your online tribute. Try out some of the options above and have fun!

One way the you of the present can make a time travel journey is by writing a letter to your future self to be opened in the future. To your future self, the letter will be a visit from the past.

What can be gained by writing a letter to yourself? Depends on how good your letter is. You have the opportunity to say something to your future self. What would you want to communicate? You’ll be able to talk to yourself 5, 10, 15 years down the road. There may be instructions for your future self, or you may have goals that you will want to check up on.

There are a lot of things you could include in your letter or letters to yourself. The more you include, the more beneficial the letter will be to you.

What to Include in Your Letter

Here are some ideas of things to include in your letter:

• You current thoughts and feelings about life, religion, politics, society, etc.
• Your feelings for your family
• Where you are at in your life and where you want to be. This could apply to where you want to be physically, financially, emotionally, socially, spiritually, and any other “lly” ending word.
• Your current likes and dislikes
• Your goals
• Your dreams
• Places you want to see
• Where you want to live
• Habits you want to have formed
• Habits you want to have changed
• The type of person you want yourself to become

Be creative with what you put in your letter. Include a current picture of yourself or family to help emphasize the period from which the letter came.

Storing Your Letter

You can store your letter in a number of different ways. Below are a few ideas for saving your letter to be opened at a future date.

Give the Letter to a Friend or Family Member

Depending on the reliability of the individual, give your letter to a friend or family member to keep and mail to you. Be careful giving your letter to a family member or friend who has a high level of curiosity and a low inhibition because they may read your letter. Still, it’s an option you could pursue. If you can get others to participate, have them write letters to themselves as well and designate someone to be the letter holder until it’s time to send the letters.

Use a Service Online to Store Your Letter and Email it to You

There are a few services out there that will store your letters and then email or mail them to you at the specified time. Some services are free while others have a fee attached. A website that provides this service for free can be found at http://www.futureme.org and will email you on the date you specify the letter you created. When writing and submitting your letter, chose the “private” option to keep your letter private.

Write and Save the Letter

Type or hand-write your letter, and seal it in an envelope. Label the letter “Personal Letter to Self (add your name) Do not Open Until (add date).” Store your sealed letter in your safe with other important documents.

Save the Letter on Your Computer

You can create your letter, and store it on your computer and not read it until the date you specify. Name the file “Letter to Self (your name) open after (date)” and that should help you from opening the document early. Store the letter in a special folder away from your regular documents.

Don’t Limit Yourself

You don’t have to limit yourself to writing letters only to yourself. Write letters to your future children. You could set specific ages for them to open their letters. You could also have your children write letters to themselves.

A fun activity is to have your children write letters to their future children. Keep their letters safe until they have children. For example, have them write a letter at age 16 to their future children when they reach the age of 16 and so on.

You can also create letters to be opened at specific events rather than a specific time. Write a letter to yourself to be opened before you get married with gentle reminders about the type of person you want to marry. Write a letter to be opened when you have your first child or grandchild or are considering a career or life change.

Remembering

To many of us, these letters are a good reminder and a proverbial “kick in the pants” to get going on what we thought we’d be accomplishing in the future. Make the most of your letter writing, and you’ll help your future self make the most of the present.

Good luck with your letter writing, and we’ll see you in the future.

There are many ways to honor our ancestors. The best way is by living a life that would make them proud. Other ways we can honor our ancestors include:

• Preserving their memories and histories
• Collecting their information into a book
• Passing on their wisdom
• Keeping a united family and preserving family ties
• Remembering them
• Visiting grave sites

There may be a certain way to honor our ancestors that you were not aware existed. There is a special monument in the United States dedicated to those who have immigrated to America.

Remembering the Struggles of our Immigrant Ancestors

Think of the struggles that your ancestor went through to decide to leave his or her homeland and embark on a journey to live in a foreign country. Why did they leave their homeland? Was it for economic, religious, or social reasons?

Some left in the heat of the summer, others came in the dread chill of winter. Some came in the ease of an airplane while others spent weeks on ships and traveled with hundreds of others seeking a new and better life.

Did your ancestor have to learn a new language upon arriving in America? Was there enough to support your ancestor financially or did he or she have very little? Needless to say, there were probably many, many challenges and hardships. Many sacrificed all to start a better life for their family.

Wall of Honor

The Wall of Honor located at Ellis Island is a special monument because you can include your ancestor’s name on the wall. The name needs to be of the person that immigrated to the United States. It doesn’t matter if your ancestor came through Ellis Island or not. It doesn’t matter when your ancestor came to America.

The monument really is special in that it is open to all who have immigrated to United States.

See a pictures of the wall at http://www.wallofhonor.org

How Many Names & How to Search?

The wall has over 700,000 names have been included on the wall.

Search the list of names to see if your ancestors are already included in the wall at http://www.wallofhonor.org/search.asp
Adding Your Ancestor

If your ancestor is not included on the wall, you can fill out the order form to have the name placed on the wall. There is a one-time fee to have names added to the wall.

Add your ancestor’s name on the wall, and next time you’re in New York, stop on over to Ellis Island and see your ancestor’s name on a monument.  To view the National Parks site about Ellis Island, click here.

Of the many ways to honor your ancestors, don’t forget the ones that traveled far and in many cases gave all to provide a better future for their families.

I did a while back and purchased a world map I started to put pins in the locations that I had visited, and it was great. The only problem (aside from the fact that I needed to visit many more places) was that the pins designated the location, but I wanted a guide to show when I visited the various places and perhaps display a line or two about the trip.  There just wasn’t space on the map to do that.

With the Internet, it’s now very easy to create a map that can show the places you’ve been as well as a little blurb you’ve written about the location or trip.

You can utilize Google Maps for free to create a map identifying the places you’ve visited around the world, the places that you’ve lived, or both at the same time!

In a previous article, we explored using Google Maps to create a visual representation of where your ancestors came from, but this article is about preserving your travels.

Use the service whichever way that suits your needs best. Below are instructions on how to map your personal travels.

Create markers and descriptions, even upload pictures of the locations by using Google Maps.  Example:

 Setting up Your Visual Vacations Map

1. You’ll need a free Google Account. If you don’t have one, click the “Sign In” link at the top of the Google Maps page to create a free account (this way, you’ll be able to save your maps).
2. Once you have an account, click on the “My Maps” tab on Google Maps.
3. Select “Create New Map” and name your map.
4. You’ll now be able to add place markers and lines to your map by clicking the icons in the top left of your map.
5. When you set a marker, you can give it a name. You could enter the date you visited (or lived there) and the name of the place as a good naming convention for the title. Add a description about the place or your visit.

Customizing Your Personal Location Map

Once you’ve created a number of places that you’ve visited on your map, you may want to differentiate between places where you lived, took vacations, and traveled to for work. Customizing your map is no problem. When you click on a location marker to edit the description, click on the location marker that appears up in the description. You can then change the color or type of marker.  Use one color for places you’ve lived, a different color for the vacations you’ve taken, and a third color for business travels.

Adding Pictures

You can add pictures to the location descriptions by clicking the “Rich Text” or “HTML” options. You can click the picture icon in the “Rich Text” mode to link to a picture you’ve posted online or you can embed links within the HTML code in the “HTML” editing view of the description. You can even embed video!

Sharing Your Vacation Pictures and Travels with Others

If you would like to share your newly created map, click the “Send” link located above your map, and you’ll be able to email your map to your friends and family.

Have fun, and get started!