Found!!! The New Jerusalem

Driving through the neighborhood last week, I saw Kent Johnson (one of the producers for the LDS Motion Picture Studios) so rolled down the window and asked for a little more detail on exactly where the New Jerusalem was being built.  "It's two and a half miles southwest of the center of Goshen,"  he said.  Armed with that info, I took the plane up for a short flight yesterday and flew right to it (attached are shots).  I probably saw it before but was expecting something a lot larger and just assumed this was the beginnings of a new dairy or something!  It looks like a nice setting and sits on a gentle hill, similar to the real temple "mount".  

In other news this week... Frank has been stranded in Singapore due to the major earthquake in Japan! His was supposed to be back Saturday but since he connected through Japan, all flights were cancelled.  Originally, he was going to have to wait until Wednesday but was able to switch airlines and now hopefully will be home by Sunday night.  Everyone else from the company had left already so hopefully, he was able to lay by the pool, order room service and relax--since there's not really much to do in Singapore! 

It was a treat Friday night to stop at Nikki and Will's where Steve, Shannon and fam were with Brandon, Ashlee, Talmage and little Tanner.  Great to catch up with Brandon and hear about his adventures at business school in Pennsylvania.  They are looking to spend the summer in Mexico on an internship.  Darling little boys! I haven't spent any time with them since they got married and fun to see them as full fledged parents.

Video chatted with the Webbs last night and Don, Greshen and fam had spent the weekend there skiing and fooding. Gordon gave me the official word on the staff infection at the dairy and all the steps they've implemented to get it under control.  He said they have had two problems....the first was they had too many cows.  The second one was the infection which is taking care of the first problem! But, it sounds like they have been monitoring and have the known infected cows quarantined and will be selling off most of them.  The infection is possible to cure 70% of the time if the cow is a young heifer but in an older cow that's has had it for a while, it's not curable.  The infection is a bacteria called......something (I didn't write it down)...sounded liks SMACK!

Dan came down to look at some apartments with me on Thursday as I'm trying to figure out a retirement plan.  They looked good but in doing more research, I can't easily use my existing retirement as a down payment which is what I was looking to do. He then went with me to sign the papers on a living trust and a will that I had had done on the advice of my financial planner.  They took it pretty seriously as you can see by the picture where the notary put the witnesses under oath that they had seen me sign it of my own free will and choice.  So in case I die, the Idahome becomes a family retreat with an endowment to take care of it and the rest of my savings goes to mission funds and education tuition scholarships for all the descendants of Grant & Zan Clegg.  The process (while a little pricy) was very educational and if any of you have assets of over $100k (the amount that requires everything to go through probate by the State), you should look into it and I will give you copies of my documents. Dan and I then celebrated with lunch at the India Palace--an all you can eat buffet of all kinds of Indian food including vegetable cutlets, masala, tandori, etc..  

My house has been a bridal bastion all week! My friends the Mayhews from Japan have been here as their daughter Maurine got married yesterday.  Wally has been here since last week and then Glen and Vera came in Thursday night.  They live in Tokyo and missed the earthquake by a few hours.  They have been in contact with friends that say their area wasn't affected to much.  They say everyone in Japan is just used to earthquakes in general and people tend to recover rapidly.  They were headed out this morning but postponed a day as Vera's school is closed tomorrow.  It's been fun to have them here and there has been a steady stream of family and people coming and going with a full on dress production shop.  Their niece Allynn is a costume design major and brought her Juki and PAFF sewing machines and made up bridesmaid dresses for all involved. The reception was nice and they served sushi! 

Ben pulled the trigger on a plan to take the three older kids to the Holy Land before Megan gets married.  It sounds like a great time and would love to go with them.  He called yesterday to see if I thought that Petra was worth it as a side trip into Jordan.  

Just so everyone is aware of the dates: 

Nick & McKelle are getting married on June 4th

Alex & Megan are getting married on July 1st