October 10th - Got siblings?

Photo by Joshua Clay on Unsplash

Got siblings? Today is my brother's birthday. So I went into my Legacy family file and noticed that I don't have a whole lot of entries for him. Hmm, probably because I think "I can get Michael's information in a phone conversation, or when I see him at Thanksgiving or next year's family reunion."

But as we have all learned, anything can happen in life and we should never put off those opportunities to learn more about family. And our siblings are a great opportunity to practice our skills as interviewers (we know where to find our close family members, so they should be "low hanging fruit" on our trees). Today, let's spend 15 minutes (or more if you have the time) putting together some interview questions for your siblings.

Whether you have one or seven siblings (yes, I have more than a few siblings to interview!), take a look at the interview questions in Legacy and do a bit of picking and choosing and even adding - and come up with an interview sheet to use with your siblings (either in a phone call or google+ hangout, or in person over a cup of coffee or glass or wine, or before or after a family get-together).

Perhaps you don't have siblings (sorry about that - you really missed out - siblings teach you many life lessons). If that is the case, I hope you had a really good friend growing up that you have remained close to. Why not interview that friend (very close to a sibling) and add him or her to your Legacy family file. While s/he might be unlinked in terms of genealogy, s/he is most definitely linked in terms of family history.

I am working on my interview sheet as I write and will share it later this week. What questions are you going to include in your interview sheet? Have you already interviewed your siblings? If so, please share what you asked and what you learned about them.