A little bit of a treat before Halloween...

Greetings,
Like many of my blogger friends, I have been working on my family history for quite a while now. I still get very frustrated when I make one of the simplest mistakes and don't realize it for too long a period. Where did my brain cells go??
Example-I have been searching for the names of Katharine Ball's parents, my GGG grandparents. They were not listed on Katharine's death certificate. Katharine's sister Julia died in April of 1928. Both sisters are buried in Oakwoods Cemetery here in Chicago. I contacted the Cook County Clerk's office for a copy of Julia's death certificate only to be informed that they had no record of it. (Cost $15). According to Oakwoods Cemetery, Julia died on the 24th of April and was buried on the 26th. That tells me, she had to have died close by. Where else could I find a death certificate if the county clerk doesn't have it? The cemetery doesn't have a burial permit either, which may have indicated where Julia had died. I tried to think of other places to find Julia Sommer's death certificate.
I tell people all the time, try different spellings for your ancestors. Many times names are misspelled on any document including vital records. Did I follow my own advice? After way too long a period of researching. A light bulb FINALLY went off. I was searching for Julia Sommer, but could a death certificate be under Julia Summer? Yes, I searched the Cook County death index and there she was...date of death matched! I requested a copy from Chicago Genealogy and within one day had a digitized copy of Julia's death certificate. (Cost $5.46, including PayPal fee) All the information matched with what I already knew...her date of birth, husband's name and address. Julia's son Phillip was the informant on the death certificate and he was quite knowledgeable. He knew Julia's parents names and where they lived! Galief Sommer and Elizabeth Rusch Sommer resided in Neckargemund, Germany. I now know the names of my GGG grandparents on another branch of my tree!
"If only..." can now be another lesson learned the hard way. Sure hope I don't need to learn it the hard way again. I am thrilled to add two more names to my research but also to have another direction to move toward finding even more ancestors!
What a great hobby!