Everyone is Irish on Saint Patrick’s Day

If you have taken the Ancestry DNA test you might know that they recently updated their reference samples and your results may have changed. Your DNA didn’t change, just the nationalities they attribute to different segments.  The first time I took the test I was 19% Irish. I wasn’t surprised, as I have found many Irish ancestors, but my maternal grandmother was surprised she was so Irish, and if you have watched my About video you know I took her to Ireland to prove to her she was Irish and that trip was the inspiration for the name Lead Sheep Productions.

In the most recent update both of our results shifted to being less Irish and more Scottish. At first I was surprised, but then I remembered the term “Scotch Irish.” Many Scottish first immigrated to Ireland before coming to the United States, sometimes for many generations. As I mentioned in my blog, Am I German, our ancestors moved, or were invaded, a lot more then we think when we were are looking back at where our ancestors came from.

DNA can be fun and helpful. I learned a lot about my Irish 2nd great grandmother, Mary Lynch that I would never have know without information from a cousin match. But the truth is we all share 99.9% of our DNA and are more alike then different.

So even though I’m a wee bit less Irish this year, down to 11%, I will still celebrate the traditions of the ancestors that came before me, and that everyone is Irish on Saint Patrick’s day.

What are some of your Saint Patrick’s day traditions?