Adding Branches

Our church is big on families and doing family history work. We believe that families can be sealed together forever, which means that after death husbands and wives will still be married and they will be with their children in the next life. One thing our church does is temple work for people who have passed on. Those of us who are living can step in for those who have passed on and we can do their temple work for them. We can seal their families together. Yesterday in church in the adult women's class, we talked about how important it is to go to the temple and do the work there that needs to be done. One of the tools we have is a website called New Family Search. Last night I went onto the website to look at my family tree. My dad had completed some family history charts a few years ago, so I just wanted to see if everything matched up. As I searched, I found a mistake. When I looked up the name of Charles William Ashley I noticed that someone had entered the wrong name for his wife. What I had on the records my dad wrote did not match the family tree on the website. His daughter's name was there instead of his wife's. It took me a while, but today I figured out how to correct the mistake. As I worked, I was able to put Charles with his wife Elizabeth on my family tree and I was also able to add their children to their branches. As I worked to get this family all back together in the right place I felt the spirit of this sweet mother close to me. I knew that she was happy. I knew that she was excited that someone had found the mistake and was making the corrections. And now, Dave and I can go to the temple and stand in for Charles and Elizabeth and they can be sealed. Then we, along with others attending the temple, will be able to have their children sealed to them. It was so fun to look at my family tree and to click on names and to see how far back our family goes, to see the different directions the branches go, and to realize that no matter how big it gets, we're all connected.

If you want to look up your family tree go HERE. The website is free and you can search and see if information for your family has been entered. If there isn't anything there you can start making your own family tree, do research, look for records and find family members. Try it out and see what you can find.