I have a "Leaf"!

 Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Have you received an email from FamilySearch that said you had new notifications?  Have you been on FamilySearch and noticed the red dot by the little bell icon on the top right hand corner of your home page?  Have you heard the expression “you have “a leaf”? So many questions, right? 

Family Search regularly sends out notifications when there are changes to the family members you are watching on your tree, or when they have new records for a family member on your tree, or if they have updated your family tree birthday calendar, etc. They also notify you when ordinances have been completed for a name on your reserved list.

These notifications help you add sources, documents, fun stories and more to your family tree and to stay on top of changes that may have been made. One of the more common forms of notifications comes from Ancestry.com, called a Leaf.  FamilySearch uses this same type of notification process and posts it on your little bell on your home page.

When you notice a red dot on the bell, click on the bell.  A drop down list with a listing of recent notifications will appear.  The ones that have not been opened will be listed in bold font.

As you open the notification, you will see what is new.  For example, I have just opened the notification entitled Changes to People You Follow.  The top of the list shows how many people in my tree are included in this notification, then lists the people with their birth and death dates, and shows me the total number of changes. By each person’s name is the listing of the type of change. 

To see details on the changes, click on the person’s name.  The summary box will open.  Choose “person” from the bottom right hand corner and you will be taken to the person’s page.  You can view the changes.  If you accept them, you do not need to do anything.  If you do not agree with them, you may change them again to be what you understand to be correct.

One of the benefits of the FamilySearch program is that you can make changes to a record when it has an error.  This is also a drawback, to some extent, because some changes made by ourselves or others are not correct.  Unfortunately, we are human and do not always have the documents or sources to back up our changes. 

Enjoy exploring your “leafs” as you continue to add to your family tree.  Have a wonderful Sunday and remember, we are here for you.  Just give us a call.  Brother and Sister May

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Indexing is so easy!

  Dear Brothers and Sisters,    I have been impressed to start a weekly “blog of sorts” to help our ward do Family History.   When Brother May and I were first called as Consultants, we posted a little note in the weekly bulletin on Sundays and had a monthly Family History Challenge for our ward.   I miss that opportunity to inspire you and your families to do family history and, to tell you the truth, I have been wondering how to get going again.   The answer to my prayers came in this month’s LDS Living Magazine.   An ad caught my eye.   It showed an old photo of a family and had the words:   “Can you hear us?   We need your help.”   Then in the body of the ad it stated:   “We are your family, your ancestors from the past.   We are on the other side and need your help.   The records of our lives need to be found and submitted for saving ordinances. You may have felt our promptings to act.   In fact, you may f...
Read more

Til We Meet Again

  Dear Brothers and Sisters, We are sure you have heard by now that we are moving out of the ward.   This will be our last posting.   We wanted to leave you with some thoughts as we have been downsizing. One article we found was from The Nome Nugget, a newspaper from Nome, Alaska.   Brother May received this paper when he was a reporter working in Nome.   On the front page of the Thursday, April 14, 1988 edition, is an article entitled “Family history salvaged at Nome City Dump”.   It is a story about a man who was tossing a load of trash in the Nome City Dump and his foot slipped on something slick.   He picked it up and found a baby book among the items.   The book contained more than 100 photos and notations from a mom about her new baby son.   The notations covered his life from his birth in 1946 through the year 1962.   They included information about his family members – his father, his brother and his mom.   As the man lo...
Read more

Tools: Merging Duplicate Records

  Dear Brothers and Sisters, Recording family history can be fun and frustrating at the same time.   We have been blessed with great programs and electronic tools that make it much easier today than in past years, but with that, there is a greater possibility of getting false information as well.   How do we sort it all out? One method is “Knee Mail”.   When in doubt, ask Heavenly Father for help.   He will guide you.   This week we are going to begin discussing the section on the right side of our family member’s page on FamilySearch entitled “ Tools ”.    These tools are wonderful helps in our sorting out the information to ensure what we have is accurate.   The first tool is “ Possible Duplicates ”.   You may have noticed at the top under Research Helps a warning symbol that showed you have possible duplicates on your family member.   You can access the information from this warning or go to Tools and access it with the l...
Read more