Sunday, May 6, 2012

National Conferences

In the summer of 2011, my dearest friend, Susan, convinced me that I absolutely, positively, no questions asked, HAD to attend the 2011 FGS Conference with her in Springfield, Illinois. Ohhhh, am I so glad I went with her!  She introduced me to so many new people in the world of genealogy.  One evening, we had dinner with two very well-known speakers on the genealogy conference circuit.  I was the outsider going in to dinner, and came out a contemporary!  How awesome was that!  It was definitely one of the defining moments on my genealogy yellow-brick-road.

This year, my dearest friend, Susan, has convinced me that I absolutely, positively, no questions asked, HAD to attend the 2012 NGS Conference with her in Cincinnati, OH. On Tuesday morning, I will leave to go pick up my friend, Susan, and then head to Cincinnati.  I am so looking forward to this event.

The Ohio Genealogical Society, and the Hamilton County Chapter of the Ohio Genealogical Society are co-hosting the NGS Conference this year. As I am now on the executive committee of OGS, I feel honor bound to participate in this conference.  I quickly and graciously volunteered to be a room monitor for several sessions.  As a member of the Genealogical Speakers Guild, I will also introduce several of the speakers. I know that it takes an army of volunteers to make a conference work. I will do my part as well.

I am looking forward to renewing friendships made in Springfield last fall.  Conferences are a way to meet our friends in person that we follow on other social media arenas.  I am also looking forward to meeting new "friends".

The world of genealogy has me following my own yellow-brick-road and it seems to take several twists and turns on me. I am loving every minute of it.  I would have never dreamed I would be "where" I am and doing "what" I am at this point in my life.  It is totally awesome.

The OGS booth will be a beehive of activity.  Stop by our booth (#201, 300) to see what OGS has to offer, along with some great giveaways and prizes. Be among the first 400 attendees to visit our booth and win a nifty OGS coin purse, perfect for those trips to the library. Take a guess at how many candy buckeyes are in a jar and possibly win either a $100 Amazon.com gift card, a $50 iTunes gift card, or the candy-filled jar. And if those prizes aren’t tempting enough to make a guess, how about this: Guess the exact amount of buckeyes in the candy jar and you get to take home ALL the prizes! Need a new ride? Well, we have that covered too. Purchase a book of five car raffle tickets for $25 and be entered into a drawing for an OGS life membership. Forget your flash drive at home? No worries. Just donate $10 or more to our Isaly Matching Fund Campaign and receive an ultra slim, ultra cool 4 GB flash drive.
 
Enjoy your conference experience, as I will mine. 

And don’t forget, when you are in need of finding your Ohio ancestors, OGS is here to help.


Friday, May 4, 2012

Family Recipe Friday - Rhubarb Pie

My mother's mother, Viola Pfeiffer Werner, loved to work in the kitchen.  Whenever we visited the farm for a Sunday afternoon, there was always an abundance of food and always there were cookies or desserts.  My mother's parents' farm was the one place we all liked to go.  Grandpa had cows, pigs, chickens and over 60 acres of land with woods and a river.  As children, my 2 sisters and I often spent weeks at the farm in the summer.

My grandma was very active in her church, the First Congregational Church of Sullivan, OH.  Sullivan, OH is one of those small crossroad communities where the church was a major gathering place.  Actually, Sullivan had two churches and my dad's parents went to the other church in town, the First Christian Church.

In 1950, the women of the First Congregational Church decided to create a cookbook of their favorite dishes.  It wasn't until the 1990's that I was aware of this.  When my mother passed away in 1999, I was going through some of her cookbooks to take home to my daughter.  (My mother was a collector of recipes in any form and would often jot them down on the back of an envelope.)  I ran across a small red-covered spiral-bound cookbook of recipes called Cook Book - Compiled by Sullivan Congregational Church Sullivan, Ohio and dated 1950.  When I opened the book, I was totally swept away by the fact that all of the recipes were presented in the handwriting of the submitter.

Naturally, I started looking for my grandma's handwriting.  I would know it if I saw it.  And, I found it!  I found her handwriting on pages 20 and 21.  One recipe was for a rhubarb pie and the other was for chocolate cookies.  Now, I remember very well those chocolate cookies sitting in the cookie jar on the counter in the big kitchen.  But, I didn't remember the rhubarb pie.

One of my mother's sister had made this rhubarb pie for a family gathering.  I asked her about the recipe for it.  She said it was her mother's recipe! It all came together when I found the cookbook with the recipe in my grandma's handwriting.  This pie has become a family favorite and we all can't wait until rhubarb is in season.

This pie is not the tart taste that is associated with rhubarb pie.  The topping on this pie gives a certain sweetness to counteract the tartness.