How do I begin ???????

This is a tricky question. How do you begin? First and full most you gather as much information you can from living relatives. talk to you Parents, Grandparents,Aunts and Uncles. Take notes on everything they tell you, your primary information needed is FULL names (first, middle, last) Dates (Birth,Christening,Marriage,death) Places (birth,Christening,Marriage and Death). Do not worry if anyone you talk to doesn't have a clue most information can be found online (if they are deceased) and can be obtained by the clerks office. I have made myself a template I call census records  (see Pictures Below) each line is for every Grandparent and then I have columns for key Items I am trying to obtain.

As you can see I just black out what I DON'T need  and Highlight what I have gotten.


Second would be to set up a program to store all this new information in. If you use the computer, there are a couple programs you can use. I Use a combination of PAF = Personal Ancestrial File this you can obtain in the attached link to the LDS Family site. the other one I use is a similar program with a tad bit more Link is attached to this post. BOTH programs are realisiic and easy to use. Neither really needs any explanaition to how to use it unless your an LDS and need to do Temple Ready