Crista Cowan

Crista Cowan Need help building your family tree or exploring your AncestryDNA® results to make more discoveries? Sign up for my email newsletter now! Visit CristaCowan.com

We’re heading into the final hours! 🌸I know I’ve been talking about our Spring 2026 Workshop Series for a couple of week...
04/18/2026

We’re heading into the final hours! 🌸

I know I’ve been talking about our Spring 2026 Workshop Series for a couple of weeks now to those of you on my email list, and so many of you have already claimed your seats (I can't wait to see you tomorrow morning!).

But I also know how busy April gets. Between "RootsTech recovery" and spring break, it’s easy for an email to get buried or for a "I’ll do that later" to turn into "Wait, is that tomorrow?!"

The answer is: Yes! We start TOMORROW at 9am PDT / 12pm EDT.

If you’ve been sitting on the fence, this is your official "Last Call" to join us live for the whole series.

🛠️ Foundations: To start or fix your family tree.
📖 Storytelling: To find and share stories that they will listen to.
🧬 DNA: To finally make sense of your match list.
🧱 Brick Walls: To bust through your toughest challenges.

Pick whichever workshop you need most (or join us for all four!).

A quick heads-up: I still have a few $50 Family Chartmasters gift cards left for those who grab the All-Access Bundle. If you want to spend the Spring turning your research into a beautiful heirloom, now is the time to jump in.

👇 Grab your spot soon:
https://www.cristacowan.com/workshops

Can’t wait to get started with you!
~ Crista

P.S. - I only run this full workshop series once or twice a year. So, if you can't make it live tomorrow, the 60-day replay access has you covered. You can sign up now and watch the Saturday sessions in your pajamas on Sunday morning!

04/12/2026

Three sisters. One photo album. A mystery that didn't make sense until Maureen Taylor, The Photo Detective looked at the family tree.

Each sister inherited the album, rearranged it, added her own photos, and passed it on. By the time it reached Maureen, nothing seemed to fit. Pages were out of order. Photos didn't match the timeline. It looked like chaos.

But it wasn't chaos. It was love.

When they broke it down piece by piece alongside the family tree, they realized each sister had left her fingerprints on the album intentionally. They had a plan for it. They were each adding their chapter to a shared story.

How many of us have inherited photo albums or boxes of pictures that seem like a jumbled mess and we just assume nobody organized them? What if someone did? What if the "mess" is actually a story we haven't figured out how to read yet?

This is one of many reasons why I love talking to Maureen Taylor. She doesn't just look at photos and identify them. She looks at the whole story.

💭 Have you ever inherited a photo album or box of old pictures that felt like a puzzle? I'd love to hear about it.

🎙️And if you want to hear Maureen tell this story herself, the full episode is here:
https://www.cristacowan.com/blog/rhode-island-a-spirit-of-independence

03/29/2026

Family history isn't always hiding in a census record. Sometimes it's in a recipe.

Paul Abell's family has lived in the same hollow in Adair County, Kentucky for over 200 years. He owns the cabin his grandparents lived in. He hunts the same land. He hosts his cousins every year — sometimes a hundred of them — and he feeds them snapping turtle from Casey Creek.

Cooked like chicken. Buttered generously. (Don't think about it too hard.)

I didn't know what I was missing. (I still might not be ready.)

💭 What food in your family carries a whole story with it? Let me know in the comments.

Want to listen to the whole episode? Find it here: https://www.cristacowan.com/blog/kentucky-postmasters-snapping-turtles

03/18/2026

My Irish ancestor once ended up on a government list of people considered a threat to America.

My three-times-great-grandfather would have found it hilarious that I proudly proclaim the fact that I am 36% Irish. He arrived here from County Down, Ireland during the War of 1812 and immediately found himself on a government list of people considered a threat because of where they were born.

Today we wear green and celebrate.
Back then, being Irish in America was a lot more complicated.

George Cowan was a skilled weaver.
He found a girl whose family had made the same journey from the same county in Ireland.
Together, George and Jane built a life here.
They raised a family.

One son became a doctor,
another a saddle maker who outfitted the Union Army,
and a third served as a U.S. Representative.

And 200 years later?
His great-great-great-granddaughter (whose AncestryDNA says she is 36% Irish) is out here proudly proclaiming her Irish heritage and encouraging others to do the same.

Not a bad legacy, George.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day to everyone celebrating their Irish roots today. ☘️ Go find your George.

💭 Who was the immigrant ancestor that started your family’s American story?

02/27/2026

We didn't know if we'd actually get here. 😂

100 episodes of Stories That Live In Us.

100 weeks of family stories from people who had the courage to dig, the patience to search, and the generosity to share what they found with all of us.

I'm having a lot of feelings about it, honestly.

And the story we're telling for Episode 100? It's one of the most layered, most extraordinary family histories I've ever had the privilege of sharing. Lisa Fanning descends from free Black families who were in this country before it WAS a country. Her 8th great-grandmother's name was Kate Anderson. And I got to say her name out loud on this podcast.

That's what 100 episodes is for.

Fair warning. It is an extended episode. We couldn't cut this one down to 30 minutes and I'm not even sorry.

▶️ Watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWJoZtx8VIg
🎧 Listen: https://www.storiesthatliveinus.com/1028815/episodes/18747841-indiana-been-here-all-along-with-lisa-fanning-episode-100

💭 If you've been listening since the beginning — thank you. Truly. Do you have a favorite episode? Drop it in the comments. I want to hear which stories stuck with you.

02/27/2026

We didn't know if we'd actually get here. 😂

100 episodes of Stories That Live In Us.

100 weeks of family stories from people who had the courage to dig, the patience to search, and the generosity to share what they found with all of us.

I'm having a lot of feelings about it, honestly.

And the story we're telling for Episode 100? It's one of the most layered, most extraordinary family histories I've ever had the privilege of sharing. Lisa Fanning descends from free Black families who were in this country before it WAS a country. Her 8th great-grandmother's name was Kate Anderson. And I got to say her name out loud on this podcast.

That's what 100 episodes is for.

Episode 100: "Indiana: Been Here All Along" is live now. Fair warning - it's an extended episode because we couldn't cut this one down to just 30 minutes. And I'm not even sorry because some stories just can't be rushed.

▶️ Watch:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWJoZtx8VIg

🎧 Listen: https://www.storiesthatliveinus.com/1028815/episodes/18747841-indiana-been-here-all-along-with-lisa-fanning-episode-100

💭 And, if you've been listening since the beginning? Thank you. Truly. I'd love to know: do you have a favorite episode? Drop it in the comments. I want to hear which stories stuck with you.

02/17/2026

The genealogy roller coaster hit HARD for Sue Talbot. 😅

Day 1: "Oh my gosh, he was the MAYOR! A Methodist preacher! A successful jeweler! We're from good stock! Mom is going to be SO proud!"

Day 2: (finds documents at the records office) "Oh no. OH NO. He... he stole HOW MUCH?!"

In 1884, Sue's great-great-grandfather John Jenkinson didn't just leave town. He absconded with around £50,000. (That's somewhere about 7 MILLION pounds in today's money.)

He left his wife and children to face the angry investors, the newspaper reporters, and the absolute crushing shame of it all. And then he invited the family’s young housekeeper to join him in America.

This is the reality of family history research: sometimes you go from "respectable ancestors" to "oh, we're descended from THAT guy" in about 24 hours. 😬

But here's what I love - Sue didn't stop researching when the story got uncomfortable. She kept digging. And she found an incredibly human, complicated, messy story that her family had never known.

Because our ancestors weren't perfect. They were human. Sometimes spectacularly, scandalously human. And sometimes those are the best stories to uncover and share.

🎧 Want the full wild story? Listen to this episode of Stories That Live In Us (link in comments).

It involves Chicago, scheming apprentices, assault charges in the 1900s, and a family secret that went unspoken for generations.

Have you ever discovered something SHOCKING about an ancestor? Drop it in the comments. This is a judgment-free zone! 💕

02/10/2026

March 2021. Middle of COVID.

Noah Lapidus is doom-scrolling LinkedIn (as we all were).

He has a law degree. He passed the bar. He's practicing whistleblower law—as cool as legal jobs get.
And then he sees it: "Ancestry ProGenealogists - African American Research Specialist"

His heart stops.

Because here's what Noah knows about himself: He's been obsessed with genealogy since he was 10. Not casually interested. OBSESSED.

He spent his allowance on death certificates and obituaries.

He made his grandmother schlep through cemeteries in 90-degree Alabama heat.

He got dropped off at the Birmingham Public Library like other kids got dropped off at soccer practice.

Even in law school—even while "coasting through classes" (his words!)—he was spending all his free time identifying descendants of lynching victims for civil rights organizations.

Genealogy wasn't his side hobby. It was his LIFE.

And that LinkedIn post? It felt bashert. Meant to be.

"I left law," Noah told me, "and I accepted that genealogy was and always would be my passion since the age of 10 until the day I die. And that it did not make sense to do anything else full time."

Today, Noah is a Research Manager at Ancestry ProGenealogists. He pinches himself every day.

And I love that for him.

But honestly? I love it even more for nerdy 13-year-old Noah who thought he had to hide his passion from his friends.

Because that kid? He was onto something.

Want to hear the whole episode about Noah's journey - and the true (and untrue) things he discovered in his own family tree? The link to the episode is in the first comment.

💭 Has your love of family history reached obsession stage yet? How old were you when it hit?

01/31/2026

I wasn't expecting it.

I'd just moved to Pleasant Grove, Utah. I was still sleeping on a mattress on the floor, boxes everywhere. That first morning, I walked out onto the balcony, looked at Mount Timpanogos, and ... burst into tears.

My great-grandmother had looked at that exact mountain every single day of her childhood.

I can't fully explain why that hit me so hard. I've experienced these moments more than once, standing in a place my ancestors stood, seeing what they saw, feeling this overwhelming connection across time.

Steve Bromage and I talk about this in this week's podcast episode. He calls it "sense of place." The way geography and family history intertwine to create identity.

His parents fell in love because they both had families who'd spent summers in Maine since the 1920s. Their shared sense of place literally created their family.

Your family has these places too.

The mountain your grandmother saw. The factory your grandfather worked in. The church where generations gathered. The route your parents drove every summer.

These places aren't just locations on a map. They're part of who you are.

What place "got into your bones"? Tell me in the comments 💭

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about family history lately — not just what we research, but how it feels to keep lear...
12/30/2025

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about family history lately — not just what we research, but how it feels to keep learning over time.

Some seasons are full of momentum.
Others feel overwhelming, confusing, or easy to put off.

As I plan the family history education experiences I’ll be creating in 2026, I want to do it thoughtfully and with real people in mind, not assumptions.

So I put together a short survey to better understand:
• where people are feeling stuck
• what feels hardest right now
• what kind of support would actually be helpful

Before I plan what comes next with Ancestry Virtual Events, Facebook LIVES, sessions with my pajamas & pedigrees™ community, and more, I want to listen.

If you’re willing to take 7-9 minutes, I’d truly value your perspective.

👉 Look in comments for the link to take the survey.

Thank you for helping me make what I create more supportive, meaningful, and grounded in real life people and what they need in their family history journey right now. 💛

Oh - and if you could like, comment on, and share this post it will help it get seen by others so they can contribute their opinions as well. Thanks!

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