New Year resolutions for family historians

Check your older research - does it need updating or revising in the light of newly-published or newly-discovered data?

Focus on a different line

Visit your nearest LDS Family History Centre

Visit your local archives

Handle some original documents

Check your contacts list - and get in touch with any relative you didn't communicate with in 2010

Remember that it is better to give than to receive

Think the impossible

Learn a new technique

Join a family history society

Become a transcriber

How to find your cousins so that you can share your research with them

Between 1st and 10th January you can link up with other members whether you have a subscription or not! Normally you'd need to be a subscriber to initiate contact with someone new, but there are usually two or three opportunities each year when the LostCousins site is completely free.

If you've already added every possible entry to your My Ancestors page then all you need to do is wait for your cousins to get in touch - but the chances are you don't fall into that category (less than 1% of members do). Here are some of the most common misunderstandings:

• It takes a long time to enter information (WRONG - it takes about an hour for the average member to enter ALL of their relatives from the 1881 Census, and it's something you only have to do once)
• I've entered my direct ancestors, and as I'm only looking for people who share my ancestors I don't need to enter anyone else (WRONG - most of your cousins are descended from ancestors who died before 1881)
• I've found all my cousins, so there's no point looking for more (WRONG - we all have thousands of living relatives who are 5th cousins or closer, and nobody is in contact with all of them)

Did you know that whilst it's important to enter your direct ancestors, the relatives most likely to link you to your 'lost cousins' are the brothers, sisters, and cousins who had families of their own in 1881? Most of us have between 20 and 50, yet the average member has entered less than 5. How many of these key relatives have you entered?