I was just notified that my ethnicity estimate from Ancestry has been updated once again. According to this post from Ancestry, the estimates are getting more and more accurate because they’re based on more and more data. I don’t don’t really understand how that works but I know there’s lots of information out there when I’m ready to explore.

But I found comparing my estimates with my brother’s as well as with our previous estimates pretty interesting.

Here’s a screenshot of the current new estimates with Larry and me side by side.

So Larry has a good chunk of his DNA indicating Germanic Europe, where I have just a smidge. France and Norway don’t show up in him at all. And I have what appears to be substantially more Irish blood.

Now when I look at a similar image from a year ago (which appeared in this post on our ethnicity estimates) I see how things shifted.

Larry’s portion from Ireland and Scotland went down significantly and Germanic Europe went up. His England, Wales and Northwestern Europe went down slightly and mine went up.  My percent Irish went down, Germanic Europe made its first appearance and Sweden, as well as Greece & the Balkans went away.

I don’t have time to do research to try to understand or analyze this, but I thought you might it prompt you to check to see if your AncestryDNA ethnicity estimate has been updated as well.

P.S. If you haven’t done AncestryDNA but are intrigued, for the next 12 days the kits are on sale for $59, down 40% from the regular price of $99.

I’m excited for next week’s National Genealogical Society Family History conference, which will be held in St. Charles, Missouri, practically in my back yard. One of my clients is attending for the first time (her first conference ever, in fact) and I’ll be there to show her the ropes. But here’s a slightly edited version of a post I wrote a couple of years ago for people attending their first genealogy conference.

I love going to genealogy conferences and have attended probably a dozen or so. If you’re attending the NGS conference May 8 to 11 (or any other conference, really), you might find these tips helpful!

• Bring your family tree or have access to it on a device. I frequently hear things at conferences that make me want to check my tree, to see whether I have ancestors in a locality, for example. Once, I was able to verify on my tree that the speaker, Joshua Taylor, and I were related! (I blogged about that exciting moment here.)
• Bring some way to take notes, either a notebook or device. (I prefer to take notes into Evernote on my laptop.)
• Eat a good breakfast, because you’re going to need a lot of brainpower. And bring along a bottle of water to stay hydrated. I always bring trail mix or something too.
• Be prepared to keep a list of next steps, because the sessions you attend will surely spark ideas for things to look up or other actions.
• Take a class that doesn’t necessarily interest you–you never know what new interests it might spark. (This tip came from reader Jan Rogge in a comment on my blog post about attending the Missouri State Genealogical Society conference in 2017.)
• If it’s a large conference with an app (as NGS is), download the app and decide what sessions you’ll be taking in advance of your arrival at the conference.
• Make conversation with the person next to you. You may be in a position to help him/her or vice versa. Or you could even meet a cousin that way!
• Take time after the conference to read your notes and process the conference materials you bring home.

Basically, be prepared to write stuff down because you’ll probably learn so much you’ll never remember it. Most of all, enjoy yourself!