30 November 2012

The ABCs of Family History Writing


My niece Jeni had a great idea. She loves ancestral stories. She loves her children. She’s a pretty good scrapbooker. “What if I made an ABC book about our ancestors?” she asked me. I thought it was a great idea and I said so. Then time passed and we did other things, but Jeni was working at her idea whenever she had time.

Last month she sent me the pages she had prepared for her Ancestor ABCs book. It is fantastic! She made each page the standard 12x12 and gave everyone in the family the choice of how they wanted to use it. With the help of my sister, a production editor, I put it into an InDesign book and made a pdf for printing. I chose a 12x12 hard cover version for my children and a soft cover 9x9 version for my grandchildren. I just received the soft cover books yesterday from the press. They were only $11.50 to print each one (we ordered together to get over 30 orders). And they are beautiful.

You don’t have to be just learning your ABCs to appreciate this book. The colors and designs are bright and beautiful, the photos are meaningful and the short “story” included about each ancestor that is featured leads the reader to want more. Jeni included a photo pedigree in the back and the website addresses so more can be had.

What a great Christmas gift!! Thanks Jeni.