Well, the first thing to know is that the results do not always make perfect sense…
Ancestry DNA shows that I am 75% Finnish. Odd, considering that I am only Finnish on my mom’s side. Ancestry.com explains this in an article on Unexpected Ethnicity Results.
The National Geographic project showed that I am mostly Finnish, too, wait… Now they are telling me that I most identify with a German population. Hmm…
The one fun thing about National Geographic is finding out how much caveman DNA you have. (My mom has tons of caveman DNA!)
An important step when submitting multiple test results based on one Ancestry.com subscription is to link the secondary results to the main account. My husband submitted his DNA first and claimed the account. I needed to have my own Ancestry.com account, but I was able to attach my results to the account. It is possible to switch between accounts.
You will receive a list of people with common ancestors. Clicking on a name gives you the following information.
This was not nearly as interesting as using Ancestry’s ThruLines. This is just in Beta still, but it really powerful.
In the tree above, you can see me in the bottom middle, my mom’s fist cousin to the left, and another known cousin to the right. Later generations of the family lost touch with my great-uncle Wilho’s family when they moved to Texas. I can only imagine how big this will become as more people get their DNA mapped out.