Building a house

  

I sent a PDF copy of my 58-page journal of 1977-1985 to my children with this message.

Dear Family,

While going grocery shopping today, I passed a new house being built. I have watched it for the past few weeks and I noticed that despite teams of professional carpenters working on it, some sections of the exterior walls of the main floor are still missing.

It reminded me of when we were building our house on the acreage. I was not a professional carpenter, nor were my helpers, Judy and Lloyd. But we had the exterior walls framed in 4 days and the interior walls took another 4 days.

Again and again I sensed heavenly help. On a few occasions, friends from church helped us. And sometimes I was inspired to know how to do things I had never done before. Each time I needed information, the Lord placed someone in my path that could give me what I needed. The house was in some ways a miracle. 

My friend Norm Depeel knew that I was basically an office worker, not a tradesman. As a journeyman plumber, he came to see how I was doing. Other than suggesting that I move the main vent stack a short distance from where I had planned, he seemed impressed. He said "You will save yourself a little work by placing the vent stack in a direct line between the two toilets." I appreciated his helpful suggestion.

After 40 years, the house we built still looks good. Many newer homes are in much worse shape.

I kept a journal of the construction and other things I did during 1977-1986. It is not a very good journal, because it largely ignores what other members of the family were doing. But you might still find it interesting. I have attached it.

Love,
Dad

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The journal itself would not be shared with others, but the principle is that we should avoid delaying sharing family history with our family members. 

For some time now, I have been aware that I am getting old, and I wanted to share this little journal with my family, but I never seemed to find the right time to do it. It is interesting that passing a construction site provided the impetus I needed. 

Maybe this blog posting may serve the same purpose for you.

Why I missed an appointment

I woke up this morning realizing that I had missed an appointment last night, I think it has been years since I have missed an appointment to visit someone. And it should not have happened this time.

What happened?

I have been planning training on FamilySearch Memories for a small group of people in Edmonton. As part of my preparation, I watched a BYU Family History Library video by James Tanner, He clarified something I had always found fuzzy, the distinction between when FamilySearch considers an image as a "Photo" and when it is a "Document". Basically, "If it has no faces, it is a document." 

Armed with this information I spent the evening carefully looking at thousands of items I had uploaded to FamilySearch Memories, looking for images of houses, grave stones, handcrafted items and other keepsakes, etc, and converting them to "Documents".

This kept me busy until bedtime. 

And I think I will use James Tanner's video to do the training on FamilySearch Memories.

Adding Memories to the FamilySearch Family Tree - James Tanner

Scanning with a mobile phone

 I have been scanning photos and documents for many years, In the DOS days I had a hand-held scanner. Then as the price of flat-bed scanners dropped, I gladly embraced the improved technology. When I got my first  laptop computer I bought a thin flat-bed scanner that would fit into the laptop case along with the laptop. I carried this combo with me everywhere from BC to New York, visiting as many relatives as possible and scanning their old family photos. It was amazing!

These days most of my scanning is done on the flat-bed scanner that is part of my multi-function printer. (But I bought another ultra-portable flatbed scanner as a backup.)

Then yesterday I was planning a presentation on FamilySearch Memories, and I used my phone's camera to photograph two photos, I was not satisfied by the results, So decided to try using a dedicated scanner app. After watching Youtube videos on the subject, it appeared that PhotoMyne and Google's PhotoScan seemed like excellent options. PhotoScan appeared to be free, so I decided to try it first..

To really put it to the test, I used PhotoScan on a 35mm contact print, a very tiny photo. The results were further distorted by the fact that my phone's camera was not exactly centered over the photo. i.e. skewing and perspective were issues. The app led me to hover over the circles until it recognized them. I did this twice, with no real idea of what I was doing or why it was necessary.

The end result was a better photo than the phone's camera software had produced . It is 512 KB in size, I have not yet tried printing it, but it seems like a very useable scan. 

I am more confident with my tried-and-true flatbed scanner, but I see PhotoScan as a useful alternative. 

Unfortunately. a later attempt produced fuzzy copies. I am not sure why.

So "your mileage may vary."