Share

As you collect and collate your ancestor's stories you'll start to see things you might like to share with the rest of your family. Think about whether you'd like to create an album, write a book or make a poster. Each one of these requires different types of information and media.

The online family tree websites like Ancestry, My Heritage and Geni allow you to share family trees with authorised parties, most often relatives. You can invite people to view your tree and to help you grow it. People may also request membership to your tree. Different sites allow differing levels of interaction and you can usually control access via the control panels or settings menus in site preferences.

Most of these services offer options to print out large family tree posters with as much or as little information as you like on them.

There are many ways of generating beautiful printed photo-books nowadays. iPhoto on the Apple platform has beautiful book options with many beautiful templates available. iBooks Author allows Mac users to create more extensive printed books and ebooks with galleries, maps and hyperlinks.

Web based services like Snapfish, Photobook Australia and Albumworks offer Australian based print services for Mac and PC users. You upload your photos, design your book using one of the hundreds of templates, order as many copies as you like and, presto, they arrive in the mail within just a few days.

Writing your family story can seem like a daunting task but here, too, there are many helping hands available to get you on the right track. Adult education services and community colleges sometimes offer Write Your Family History courses. The Society of Australian Genealogists (SAG) also offer courses.

Just as every family is different so is every family story, so how you tell your story will be unique to you and your family.

[share: websites, albums, books, posters]