Family Connections: 21 Day Experiment Reflection

Joy-filled is how I would describe the past 21 days as I've participated in the Family Connections 21 Day Experiment! I've looked back over my Build Your Own Plan calendar and tallied my daily connections. If you notice more than 21, it's because some experiences count in more than one category and some days I was an overachiever doing multiple things on one day.

• Connections to the Past   
• Collected some of Dad's favorite sayings into a word document  
• Celebrated Grandma Scifres' 145th birthday on May 10th and shared a letter that I wrote to her as part of my #52Stories project for 2020  
• Shared the poem I wrote for Mother's Day 2009, "My Mother's Hands" with my siblings         

• Connections to the Present   
•  Used Dad's sayings to create a nursery lesson for at-home church for Jack 
• Chose favorite quotes from General Conference with extended family and created Conference Gladness Brackets for May (We're down to the Championship Match between Elder Holland's "Hopes for the Future" quote and Elder Ricardo P. Gimenez "Storms of Life" quote.)
• Created a character sketch of my oldest sister, Velma, for my #52Stories project for 2020
• Shared pics of new granddaughter
• Posted a pic of me with four women in our family who have influenced me as a mother
• Created a Zoom Mother's Day gathering with my siblings & invited everyone to bring a story or something to share that reminded them of Mom
• Wrote a #52Stories blog post about our sibling Mother's Day gathering
• Shared a post about the best gift a mom can ever receive, The Gift of Words
• Watched Robby and Jack so daughter Sara could quilt
• Saved favorite Ruthie pics from Dropbox to my photos
• Shared daughter Sara's 7th grade project, Fresh Baked Family Favorites, with brief bios and favorite recipes of herself, her mom, grandmothers, and some of her great grandmothers
• Baked my favorite recipe, Yum Yum Cake, and wrote a post about it for my #52 Stories for 2020 project
•  Shared Ruthie and Teddy pics I snapped from a Face Time visit   
• Family Search Experiences 
• As a new family history consultant, worked with a member of our congregation on two different occasions who taught me far more than I taught her 
• Called a friend I met at Roots Tech who helped me merge two records
• Found the gravestone & obituary for an uncle and attached them to his record in Family Search  
• Added some items to my To Do List on Family Search
• Shared a padlet I created with links to articles of interest for me from the Family Search blog
•  Attached new articles of interest I found to the above padlet
• Found a Ruthie in our family tree (new granddaughter's name)
• Attached a wife and daughter to my great uncle's record on Family Search
• Attached my mom's history of my grandmother's life that my brother typed up this month     
• Had a chat with Family Search Help to figure out how to restore a lost relative to the tree     

• Family History Connections in Picture Books

• This Is the Rope by Jacqueline Woodson
• All the Places to Love by Patricia MacLachlan

My Favorite Experience

 The Mother's Day Zoom gathering with my siblings! 

What I Liked 
Face Time and Instagram conversations
Facebook posts from others that inspired me

Learning that we're doing this again in October

What I Wished For

A blank 21 day calendar provided in just black and white 

for tracking what I did each day (I had to use yellow stickies 

for the dark days on the printable calendar.)