ending genealogy - time to move on

[pharmaT]

I'll never finish either. I was going through my tree last night trying to work out what I don't know and the list is very long though I didn't get through the whole tree in one evening.

Do pop in from time to time.Even if it's just to the common room.

[panda40]

I think some people new to this wonderful hobby get disillusioned to it as it does not all fall into place the same as it does on the TV programmes. If you hit a brick wall early on in your searches it can Throw you off from continuing. It also depends on how much information you have to start with. Another factor to take into concise ration is the cost and time involved. I have been doing mine for over thirty years and still enjoy it just as much. I still get excited when new sources are released and I can pad my tree out more.
The beauty of this hobby is you can return to it when ever you want.
Regards panda

[eadaoin]

I've sort-of finished for about the last 10 years, as Irish records run out about 1780-1830 depending. But then I started to follow distant cousins forward (usually courtesy of Rootschatters!).

I'm hooked, so  need my daily fix on this site, and I also took up recording graveyards - my friends think I'm demented about graveyards, but you lot here will understand!

Good luck, Gill, with whatever you do next! Enjoy!

[jess5athome]

As already said by others, it must depend on what you are / were looking for, I only started because my niece wanted to know about my late father in law (The Grandad she never knew) and wow! it just grew from there. I don't think I'll ever be at the end as there's always something.

Best of luck and my good wishes in all that you do in the future, drop by sometime 

Frank.

[carol8353]

Many years ago I told my mum that I was going on a coach trip to the FRC in London,she said "But I thought you'd finished all that genealogy lark " !!!

Just because I'd managed to put her in touch with her 10 cousins,she thought that was the end of my search.

Over 30 years later I'm still searching and desperately hoping to go farther back into the 18th century on all my lines,but have massive brick walls...........no one being baptised is one of them 

Carol

[ThrelfallYorky]

It's impossible to "finish", once you've been bitten! I can't seem to get any further on most lines, after all the time spent on it, but I live in hope, and still keep pottering around records / Ancestry. I'd like to say I can help a lot of others - but compared with the real experts on here, I'm still going "Goo-goo - gurgle gurgle" - but it's nice to try.
Gill, can't believe you've "finished"

[snooziflooze]

I've recently managed to get back to 1710 on one of my lines, much to my surprise, but I'm now up against a brick wall on this line, as I so want to push it back even further and just can't find the baptism I'm looking for.  Obviously looking in the wrong place...

Not so long ago, I got really cheesed off and dropped it for a bit, to concentrate on other things.  But now I'm back and raring to go.  Look out ancestors.  I'm coming for you! 

No, as others have said, I don't feel that I've even started with this genealogy lark and I've been at it now for about 8 years.  The end is nowhere in sight...

[Guy Etchells]

When I started in the 1950s I only had to record my family but then I married and had another set of ancestors to record, then my sons got married and that brought more and more lines to record, now my first grand children are nearly old enough to have partners and the tree will expand yet again.
That plus further research into my original lines means my family history is nowhere near being finished.

Other people take up genealogy for a more specific purpose and complete their research in a few years. That is their choice, perhaps they will leave it forever but perhaps they or their children might take up where they left off and carry on for more years.
That is one of the joys of genealogy we can do as much or as little as we like.

One thing I have noticed is how it all comes round in a circle, when I started much of my genealogy was done at home writing letters and waiting for replies, when I became a teenager and an adult my research changed to visiting more archives and libraries etc. rather than writing to them, now as the years go by I am again doing a high percentage of genealogy at home and waiting for the internet to supply the results (albeit far quicker than Royal Mail did in the past).

Cheers
Guy

[Rena]

I had the same idea as Gill.  I learned we had a WWI casualty and felt so guilty that I hadn't known there'd been one in the family that I set out to look for him. Once I'd found him I told myself I could get on with other things in my life.   

As you can see, I'm still here because old family stories kept popping into my mind and out came the notebook and off I went searching in dark corners to see if any of them were true.  They were, but I still didn't stop because around every corner there's a big surprise waiting to be discovered.