Over the last few days I’ve been looking at the Genealogy Do Over project as presented by Thomas MacEntee at GeneaBloggers [Link]. It just so happens that a new cycle of it starts up this week on Jul 3rd – though you can follow along at any time.

What is it you ask? It is designed to get you back to the basics by helping you organize your records and research plans by setting aside everything you have in your tree. You’ll perform your reasonable exhaustive searches before examining the evidence and drawing conclusions. Most importantly however we will write down not only all of our sources but all of our searches. There is a great support group on Facebook to go along with the project as well.

I’ve been bouncing back and forth on whether or not I want to embark on this thirteen week journey.  Before I knew that such a program existed I had contemplated a similar idea. The part of me that has a ton of my paternal grandfather’s research thinks that I am crazy.  But looking back I see many items that could be cleaner.

Since I started with research, I understand the concept of proper source citing more so than ever.  Up until now I have taken the stance that I will fix it later… Well it is now ‘later’ I guess.

For this do-over, I will go back and focus on my Mothers Paternal side of the family – the Nyilas’.

I am choosing this side of the family for a few reasons. First, I’ve always been interested in the Hungarian side as I have little information. Secondly, I have recently learned a few things that I didn’t even know from my Mother about this side, so it behooves me to start fresh. Thirdly, the branch is relatively small right now so it will be easier to start afresh.  Lastly – Setting a smaller goal will be realistic for me with how busy I am in general.

Once I see how this first do-over goes, and no doubt learn new tricks techniques, I will look at a modified version for my father’s side of the family.

I would love to hear if you have experience with the Genealogy Do-Over Project and how it worked, or didn’t work, for you.