TWENTY TWO - Hello Maternal Grandma!!!

My new Treasure, a photo of my Grandma "ANNA MAE (Pickerell) ELLIS JENNINGS"

Maternal Grandma "Anna Mae and Lenora" (my mom)

One of the nicest things about finding some of my Maternal family, is the Treasures they have shared with me. One of my "First" cousins used to research the family Genealogy a few decades ago with her aunt. During the "Jennings Reunion" Oct 2018, my cousin gave me this photograph of my Maternal Grand mother with my mom as a baby. I was thrilled at my first glimpse of "ANNA MAE ELLIS Jennings" with my mom LENORA. She gave birth to 9 children, and 6 survived. My grandfather ROY Ellis JENNINGS died within 2 weeks of my mothers birth. A few years later she passed away from Cancer. Grandma certainly had a tough life.

This photo sparked my interest into Anna Mae's life

It's such a weird journey. I get tired of looking for family members and coming up empty.... then I see this photo and feel like I "Must" find out more about my Grandma. I need to know her, her struggles and get her essence. It's difficult because there is No one alive who knew my Grandma or Grandpa. There are many records on ANCESTRY, $ well spent on my membership

SO I started on a crazy search for any documents, records and DNA matches that will connect me to all things Anna Mae. I am happy to say I was able to trace back and find my Grandma's Mom, Dad and sister! I also found a few people on ANCESTRY.CA who are direct descendants of my Grandma's sister. I've written a few of them, but no reply yet. I'm using the time to search online for more info. Four times this week I have stayed up searching until 3 am - feel I'm on a roll.

Thank Gawd my search "Angels" are still with me

I think the biggest chance of success is to have folks who keep you motivated and give a helping hand. I am fortunate to have "2" such Face Book Angels, Tom Burk and Lou Hans.  Lou kept pushing me, saying "never give up Yvette, Keep moving forward" It is what I needed to hear when the search got too hard for me....and Tom Burk, well he is Amazing. Seems he has a built in Radar of when my interest wains. All of a sudden I will get a few emails with New information. OR he will ask a few questions which ignites my interest again. If you really want to find out your genealogy, join a few FaceBook Search groups, write a lot of letters on ANCESTRY, My Heritage and any other group. I still have a long way to go, but I feel blessed to have found so many family members. 

MOM is still hiding...but I "will" find her ~ stay tuned!

TWENTY ONE ~ Learning we all have the right to sing our own song Brother Steve

Brother Steve has a different Song ( path ) than mine

The Genealogy Tune is different for everyone.

My personal search for mom "LENORA Jennings" has become an all consuming melody that plays itself over and over again in my head. I ponder what else I can search for, what name, a different state, etc that can break this stale mate. I read articles & discuss it with those friends who are interested ( if they are true friends, then they get the info regardless if they are tired of it all - LOL) Even my Private Face book page with some true Search Angles, gets a regular posting to see if anyone found something new. I often check the documents I posted there to read again, bc I worry I have missed some key piece of Information. Even after all this time, I will stay at the PC until the wee hours of the night...maybe there is a New  "Ancestry DNA Match" that I haven't seen before. Maybe someone out there knows about my mom ~ it CAN happen, right?

A different Song for my Brother Steve

My excitement about everything connected to my mom includes my Brother Steve. He requested his non-identifying information from the Children's Aid Society of Canada. Well they weren't kidding...there was Nothing that could help in our search. After some gentle coaxing I got him to request the same for his Bio-dad. My thought was maybe if I located HIM, there might be a chance to find our mom. I was a little surprised when "Brother Steve" said HE wasn't interested in finding his Bio-dad!?!?!? Pardon me??? WAIT, What??? Don't you want to know if you have any other 1/2 siblings, aunts uncles, grandparents....maybe your dad is still alive? Aren't you curious? 

 Brother Steve said  "I always wanted to know about my mother and thought it would be nice to have a sister ~  my search is over now" WOW, I will admit it is hard for me to understand, BUT  I realize that we ALL have a different thirst for our roots. My husband and a close friend have NO desire to know what happened in the past, or meet any New relatives. They could care less.

My search for mom continues

SO I will accept that my Brother Steve and I have different journeys but we have a Joint mission of finding out what has happened to our mother. It would fill an emotional void to know her final resting place....to pay homage to the woman who gave us life. If she has passed, I would like to visit her grave and say a Prayer. Maybe talk to her for awhile and tell her how much I miss her.

My voyage is not over yet ~ still hoping to find my mom, LENORA JENNINGS