First of all, you have to gather all that information about your ancestors together. Do this by interviewing your family, visiting your local family history centre, or go onto the Internet. Once you have started to gather your family information together, you need to set it out in a manner where you and anyone else who looks at it, can make sense of your tree.

You can do this in several ways; one way is by sitting down and drawing out your own tree by hand. I have seen trees drawn on the back of a sheet of wallpaper. The main advantage being, that you have several metres of paper to get every single branch and twig written down. Another method is to purchase a pre-printed family tree chart, and fill in the spaces with your family information. I find these chart a bit restrictive, as I do like to have everyone marked on my tree, and these forms have limited space.

A less time consuming way is to purchase one of the family tree software packages now available. I have found that Legacy suits my needs for recording research, and have stuck with this software for several years now. It has a basic family tree chart printout built in, and is more than acceptable. Over time, though, I have found that find combining Legacy with the tree maker software 'Legacy Charting', allows me to print out a family tree to suit my individual family members, with little additional work. If your family is like mine, each one will have more interest in one branch than another.

I would advise that you purchase the software right from the start of your research. If you record all your family information onto the software from day one, it will save you having to transfer all your research at a later date. When you've reached your hundredth ancestor, it's a bit daunting to then have to re-write it all onto that software you've finally got around to buying. When all the information is recorded, you can then easily choose what information you want to show on your tree.

Once you get used to the software you've chosen, you will find that access to it through your computer is a lot quicker and easier than working your way through paper records. The Legacy software also lets you convert your files to Gedcom. This means that I can download my family tree onto my Treo 750v PDA. I find it a lot easier to have access to my files through my PDA when I'm visiting a family history room, or a cemetery in the course of my research. This saves me having to carry around reams of paperwork.

A properly laid out family tree will make sense of all that information you've collected. Everyone is shown in relation to each other, and if you want to show more of the history of an ancestor, you can, using Legacy, print out a record of your family in book form. Again, you have the convenience, that all the details you've gathered can be laid out how you want them. You can also scan your original documents into the software, and store those precious pieces of paper out of the way, in a safe place.

Another wonderful thing about using software to record your family tree, is that if you find you've made an error, it's easily rectified. If you discover that great, great, auntie Nellie was really just a close family friend, then you can change the tree without having to rip yards of paper out of your files. So not only are you getting the best for your family tree, you're helping the environment.

Learn more about this author, Mo Bruce.
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