"If you can't get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance"
-George Bernard Shaw


Saturday, April 3, 2010

Spring Cleaning

Yesterday I was cleaning out my closet for Spring cleaning and I came to the realization that I needed to do the same with my genealogy papers.  So after the closet was cleaned and the bags taken to the mini van, I decided to tackle my pile of paper that was sitting on the top of my desk hutch.  First I looked at the looming pile and thought "This is going to take forever!"  But I sat down (and after procrastinating on facebook for a time) and decided to takle the pile bit by bit.  So I took the first layer of papers off the top and sat down and started sorting.
Armed with a paper bag for recycling (yes I recycle) and started to sort out and get rid of (GASP!) my excess papers.  I once read in a book about purging your genealogy files once a year to get rid of all the excess paper.  I believe the book was Organizing Your Family Research (or sometime like that) by Sharon DeBartello Carmack.  So I try to at least once a year go through my extra papers and get rid of what I don't need.  Seriously, do I really need 5 copies of Great Great Great Grandpa Fitzgerald's Family Group Sheet when 4 of them are out of date? 
So I did make it to the bottom of my pile last night after about 5 or 6 hours and I have a full bag of recycling.  Plus I have some things on my 'To Do' list to finish up and some letters to follow up on.  Feels good to have a clean(er) desk to go with my clean(er) closert!

Happy Researching.

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