How to Find Your Relatives and Ancestors

Have you ever wondered where you came from? What your true roots are?

Genealogy intrigues most of us and we're often curious about where we come from and who our ancestors are.We wonder what our lineage is, whether we descend from royalty or famous figures in history. Lucky for you, if you trace back far enough, most of us do descend from someone famous in history. At least, some of our ancestors have done something notable. That's always interesting.

You may even be able to find some of your loved one's or distant relative's graves.

Depending on your interests and how much you are willing and wanting to research, you can find a tremendous amount of information about your past. Nowadays, there are several ways that you can easily find some of your long lost relatives or ancestors.

The DNA or ancestral websites can be a great tool for find people that may be missing, or relatives from birth families if you may be adopted.

I've personally found some of my relatives that I would never have met hadn't it been for the "advancements" we have today or the websites available to us. It truly excites the older people in my family when I tell them I've found the grave of an older relative or a distant cousin from "the home country."

The Find a Grave website located at www.findagrave.com is absolutely phenomenal and has almost any grave you could possibly be looking for, as least in the last hundred or two hundred years, and in the U.S.

You're able to search in any country around the world for graves. You can search my name or location, as well as year born and deceased. Many of the grave listings also include names of parents, spouses, and siblings.

It's amazing how many people you can find, or relatives you may uncover by looking at your ancestor's graves on Find a Grave.

If you're ever wondering what your actual genealogy or heritage is you can submit a DNA sample to one of the DNA research and genealogy companies such as 23 and Me (I am NOT an employee, affiliate, or anyhow connected to this or any other company I may mention in this article).

With 23 and Me, you order a "kit" online and it is delivered to your house or whatever address you send it to. It contains a vile, along with some information and a box to return your sample. You will need to spit into the vile after following the instructions. You need to make enough spit to fill the vile to the specified line that is adequate enough for a sample.

Once you submit your sample to the company you receive your results relatively fast. You create an account on the website and it contains all the information they have about you regarding your DNA.

You can see a list of your DNA relatives, traits, Neanderthal ancestry, lineage, and a number of other things. The site lists your relatives in order from most genetically related to least. You can also search by surname to see which other members might share one or more of your family names.

The photograph below shows you what the vile looks like, You must spit into it and fill your spit up to the line before you submit your sample.

Try the website www.23andme.com and you might find some of your close or distant relatives. You're almost guaranteed to find somebody you're related to.

Ancestry.com has been around for a long time and the data it stores continues to grow. You can create your very own family tree or contact people that may be your relatives or ancestors and have yourself added to their ancestry trees.

It's an amazing tool and website but it does require a membership and payment to access the useful parts of it.

This is a serious question that most of us ask, either of ourselves or of our caregivers. With the advancements in DNA and related technology, we're all getting that much closer to the answers.

There are so many people out there that are wondering where they came from, even people that may be certain of their identity could be mistaken. With the tools we have today, we can already identify so much, and we are only getting closer to perfection. There are so many children that don't know their biological fathers or relatives.The more people that submit to these types of websites, the closer everyone can come to finding out where they come from.

I am not an employee of any of the companies or organizations I have listed in this article. I am not affiliated or benefiting financially in any way by listing my recommendations or naming any companies in this article.