Parents with Parents: A Visual Clue
Adding Parents: New or Existing?
Adding Multiple Sets of Parents
Preferred Parents
Removing Parents From a Family
Finding People With Multiple of Parents
Using Color Tags to Indicate Multiple Parents
A couple (or a single person) appears in the middle of the family view. The parents of a person appear near the top of the family view. By clicking on a parent, you go immediately to the parent's record — where the parents become the couple in the middle of the family view, their children's names will appear below them, and their respective parents will be listed above them.
Parent buttons in the family view can be displayed in two ways...
Each family view can be configured differently (i.e., some family views can show parents stacked; some can show parents side-by-side).
To specify the layout of parent buttons...
The stacked layout works better when you include places with events inside the parent buttons.
Also, the optimal layout depends partly on the dimensions of your monitor and the size you prefer to keep the Reunion app window.
To specify the fields that appear inside parent buttons...
To make it easier to identify parents with or without parents, you can select a different color for each situation.
By default, parents who have parents entered in your family file appear with black text. Parents without parents entered appear with gray text.
To choose these two colors...
As you're about to add a parent to a person, you should ask yourself if the parent is already entered in the family file. If not, you add a new person.
If you're not sure, you can try to find the parent using the People sidebar. Or you can try the Add Father/Mother Using Search feature.
When you add a new parent, Reunion will automatically create a new family record for the parent and automatically put a child button on the parent's family record. The Edit Person panel will appear waiting for you to enter the parent's name, dates, and other details. Surnames of fathers will appear by default, based on the surname of the child; however, you may change it if necessary.
If a parent is already entered somewhere else in the family file, you should add the parent to a family by dragging the parent from the People sidebar and dropping him/her directly on the family where he/she belongs (in one of the parent buttons). Similarly, the Add Father/Mother Using Search feature will help you to locate and connect a parent (who's already in the family file somewhere) to the current family.
In most cases, you'll be adding new parents to your family file. However, if a parent already has been entered in the family file, you should not add a new parent to the records. Doing so would create duplicate entries for the same person.
One reason why an individual could already be entered is because he is related to somebody else in the family file and was previously entered in some other line of the family. A classic example is when cousins marry (interfamily marriages or "kissing cousins").
To add a person's father, use the menu button that appears above a person's name.
To add a person's mother, use the menu button that appears above a person's name.
Tip:
To add a new parent, click the empty spot where the parent belongs: an empty parent button.
As you enter step-children and/or adopted children, there may be situations where you record multiple sets of parents for a person. The best example is when entering both adoptive and biological parents. In these situations, a child will appear on more than one family (duplicate child) and thus have more than one set of parents.
To add another set of parents to somebody, use the menu button that appears above a person's name. Choose Add New Father/Mother if the parent hasn't yet been entered in the family file.
When you add a new parent, the Edit Person panel will appear waiting for you to enter the parent's name, dates, and other details.
To add another set of parents who are already entered somewhere in the family file, use the menu button that appears above a person's name and choose Add Father/Mother from the Sidebar. Then drag the parent from the People sidebar and drop him directly in the family view, right on top of the current parent. You'll be asked to confirm the new link.
Reunion lets you search for people with multiple parents. Learn more.
You can also use a color tag for a visual clue for people with multiple parents. Learn more.
When multiple parents are linked to a person, the provides the means to...
If you have a situation where a child button is duplicated — i.e. a person has multiple parents and thus he appears as a child on more than one family — you may choose which set of parents appears above the person's name. These are called the preferred parents.
The choice of preferred parents is crucial for these reasons...
To change the preferred parents...
A check mark shows you which parents are designated as preferred. Thus, if you have multiple parents for a person, and you want a different set of parents to appear above a person's name, the trick is to change the preferred parents.
If the wrong set of parents appears on a family (in the upper-left or upper-right corner), the easiest way to remove them is to drag them to the Clipboard sidebar. When you drag one parent to the Clipboard, the spouse comes along for the ride.
If the wrong parents appear above a person's name, then the person also appears, incorrectly, as a child on the parents' card. Dragging parents to the Clipboard simultaneously removes the child from the family where he appears as a child but doesn't belong there.
If a person has multiple sets of parents, then another option for removing parents is to choose (the little "v" in every button), highlight the parents you wish to remove, and click the button.
Note: Removing parents does not delete people from a family file. It only removes links between records. The parents remain in the family file, as do each parent's ancestors and descendants.
Finding People With Multiple Sets of Parents
To search for people who have multiple (more than one) set of parents...
Using Color Tags to Indicate Multiple Parents
Using Reunion's Color Tags feature, you can automatically see a visual clue in the family file for any person with multiple sets of parents.
In the example below, the person button has a yellow color tag, which we have designated to appear for anyone with multiple parents. Click here to learn how to use color tags.