Lead Sheep Productions

How are we related? An explanation of 2nd Cousins once removed.

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How are we related?
As we gather for the holidays, we will be spending time with family: parents, siblings, grandparents, and “cousins”. One of the questions I am asked most is about cousins? What is a 1st or 2nd cousin and what’s with the whole “removed thing”?
The first thing you need to know is your common ancestor.
If you share parents…you are siblings
If you share grandparents…you are 1st cousins
If you share great-grandparents…you are 2nd cousins
If you share great-great-grandparents….you are 3rd cousins
and so on…
The whole “removed thing” is to denote different generations. How is my 1st cousins’ son related to me? Our common ancestors are my grandparents but his great-grandparents. You start with the closer relationship, in this case, grandparent, making him my first cousin, and then you “remove” the relationship one generation, first cousin once removed. His child would be my first cousin twice removed.Here is another example. The picture below is my grandmother, Janice, and her “cousin” Steph at the old farm which has been in our family for generations. It was owned by Steph’s great-grandparents and its where my grandmother’s grandparents meet. It’s very cool that it is still in our family and I believe part of the reason we are still connected. Their common ancestors are Nelson and Mary. They are my grandmother’s great-grandparents and Steph’s great-great-grandparents.
So how are they related?
Great-grandparents, the closer relationship, means 2nd cousins, the extra generation makes them once removed.
Can you figure out how I am related to Steph?
Still a bit confused? Here is an example of how to map out the generations to figure out the answer.
We hope you have a wonderful holiday with your family and friends. And that you get to impress them with your new knowledge of cousins.

My Grandma Janice and Cousin Steph at “The Old Farm”
Lead Sheep Productions

Is Social Media New?

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Is social media new?

I have been working on an article for the Minnesota Genealogist about my second great grandmother, Minnie House. An excellent source for piecing together her complicated story has been newspapers.com.

As I searched for her name in the years and locations she once lived, I had to laugh at the results of lines from newspaper articles that were basically status updates.

“Mrs. Minnie House of Rice Lake spent Monday evening in the city visiting Mrs. Fred Blume.” The Dunn County News 20 Aug 1914

People have always been interested in who’s who, what they are doing, and where they are going. And I am thankful for every time my ancestor’s “status” was preserved. I always say family history is so much more than names and dates. It’s about real people that lived real lives, and these articles help us piece together the story of those lives.

It also made me wonder…what will future generations know about or think about me if they were reading my status updates?
What story does our social media tell?
Is it the story we want to tell?
and the message we want to leave?

 

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Lead Sheep Productions

You can’t go back…

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You can’t go back…
In my early twenties I worked at Paisley Park Studios for the artist Prince. As you can imagine it was an interesting experience. I often tell people, and Anne Hathaway’s character says in the Devil Wears Prada, “I learned a lot”. It was a very different life from what I live now. Since Price’s death in 2016 the people who worked for him started a non-profit called the PRN Alumni. Their mission is to continue Prince’s philanthropy, especially around music education. Last week they held the Funk n Roll fundraiser. I was excited to attend and reconnect with friends from that time in my career.
As fun as it is to reconnect it is also strange to go back. People who I used to speak to multiple times a day have now become strangers. Stories are told about you that you would handle differently now that you are older and, hopefully, a little wiser. None of us are the same person we were all those years ago.
There is also a big benefit to going back. It is interesting to see how the experience shaped who you are today, to laugh a little at your younger self, and to see the path others have taken. Each chapter in our story is important to the whole story and guides us to who we really want to be.
You really can’t go back, because it is not about a place, but who you were at that time. But taking the time to look at that chapter can help you understand who you are and where you are going. It can also be, as my clients have said, in regards to personal histories, a very cathartic experience.