Christmas was great!

Hey, how’s it going? Christmas was great. Our district came over and we opened gifts, played a little risk, talked to our families and relaxed a bit. This week we get to watch some approved movies for p-day so we are pretty excited. We are going to probably watch Polar Express and Happy Feet. The movie really doesn’t matter. Just the fact that we are getting the opportunity to watch a movie that is not church produced. So our district is coming over for that as well. Not too much has happened since I called you. If you look in church news President Stacy who is in our mission presidency as well as my ward has a whole article about him and his work as being CEO of Poudre Valley Hospital. My companion is really cool. It was a very different change from Elder Daniel. I feel more comfortable now. I felt that Elder Daniel was always breathing down my neck haha. Oh Christmas night we went caroling. It went really well except for the fact that it got really windy and cold. Because of the snow we have been walking all week. I don’t mind walking too much it just takes forever to get to places. With the ice the bikes would just be too difficult to get around. We haven't got any new investigators lately. Most of the investigators we have now are on hold until the new year. I'm excited to get started with them again. Well, sorry this email is so short. It was only a couple of days ago that I talked to you. Next week I will have more to say. Elder Cooper

Talk to you Friday!

12-22-09
So my computer freaked out and this is the second time I am writing this email. I am here at the library this Tuesday. Yesterday was transfers and we were busy all day so we never got to the library. Elder Daniel left. I was ready for a change. Its not because I didn't like him, it’s just nice to switch things up. He left about 2:30 to head up to Wyoming as a traveling elder. Basically he goes to a ward that does not have missionaries, evaluates where the ward is at as far as missionary work and if it would be wise to put elders there and then reports back. It sounds pretty awesome. Too bad it is in Wyoming though. My new companion is Elder Seve. He is from New Zealand and is Polynesian. I have only been with him for a day but he seems like and awesome missionary. It also happens that the members that we live with are going to New Zealand for 3 weeks to visit their son so we will be living in an empty house for awhile. Last week we had our Christmas devotional and we had a Book of Mormon archeologist come and speak to us. He was amazing. He had a ton of awesome pics and information of proof of Christ visiting the ancient Americas. In 2 weeks there will be a mission tour, which means that a general authority will be speaking to us! Last year it was Elder Bednar. For Christmas this week we don’t have too many plans. In the morning we are going to open gifts with another set of missionaries. I want to call everyone at 11:30 so 10:30 your time. I’m super excited to call. I don’t have a lot of questions for you but I’m sure that you have a lot for me. Keep in mind that my call can only be 40 minutes or else I will get chewed out by the mission pres. They check the phone records. The hushka came last week and it’s already half gone...yay Hushka! We have been getting so much desserts and sweets lately from members I’m to the point where I am sick of it. I wish members would give normal food haha. Talk to you Friday!

I'm now over the 3 month marker!

12-14-09
I’m now over the 3 month marker! It is crazy to think how fast time can go by sometimes. This week has been awesome too. I got to go on exchanges with a zone leader which means I spent a day on campus. We actually didn't go to campus because we had several appointments, but it was still rad. We were in the institute having appointments with people from the singles ward. It was cool to have lessons with my age group for a day. Family wards are awesome, but it is just easier to relate to those who are your own age. The week, other than that, was pretty much the same as always except for this weekend was way cool. Saturday we went to a wedding reception at the institute. One of the single adults in our ward that we know pretty well got married a week ago. We got to visit with a lot of non members as well as getting a ton of food. Later in the afternoon we did the secret Santa service project. We adopted 3 families and got a bunch of families to participate. Most of the effort and success came from the ward missionaries. Unfortunately, there were not as many non members there that we had anticipated, but there were a bunch of non members that participated in donating. So, there were still contacts with non members which is great. Now we are going to go follow up this week with everyone. To finish it all off, Sunday we committed one of our investigators to baptism. We set a date for January and I'm way excited. Overall the week was pretty solid. We have a Christmas Devotional on Tuesday with all the missionaries in the north half of our mission and a general authority should be there as well. I promise that pictures are coming soon. Oh, and to answer your question, the 9 year olds mom is a member and she joins in on the lessons which is awesome. Elder Cooper

12-7-09
Hey, how is everything going? It has been going great this past week except for it is freezing butt cold, haha. No but seriously it is about 15 degrees right now and over the last couple of days it has snowed about a foot. We have been doing a lot of snow shoveling service, especially yesterday. The bike is fine for now except for the fact that it is a little difficult to ride around in the snow but we manage. I don’t know If I am going to be transferred until the Saturday before transfers which will be the 19th. I think I will be staying but I don’t know for sure. When I had my interview with pres. Ely this last week he didn’t mention anything.
This last Monday we went to go teach the 9 year old we have been working with and usually her mom, who is inactive, sits in on the lesson, but she wasn't feeling too well. There was another lady there though that we had never met before that sat in on the lesson and instead of teaching what we were planning on, we ended up teaching the 1st lesson to her ending the night with a new investigator. It was awesome! We are meeting with her this week to teach the plan of salvation. We had our Christmas party this last week too and there was a ton of people. There were several investigators that we are going to follow up with in the week to come. It’s funny because I'm good friends with a family in the ward and the wife is the activities coordinator so I can sort of see the stress of that position. It’s a tough job. Its one of those callings that you wouldn't think that at first, but man, there is a lot of work that comes with it! This week we also have a missionary activity that we are going to do with members and the ward missionaries on Saturday. It’s like secret Santa, but the parents of the families we are helping I think already know. It should be great though. The members are supposed to invite a non member to the activity and we already have some promising results. Well, it was awesome to hear how things are going.
Elder Cooper

Thanksgiving was awesome

11-30-09
Hey, how is everything? It was good to hear from you this week. Things are going great in Fort Collins. Thanksgiving was awesome this past week. We went over to a member’s home and the wife had her mom and grandparents there who were not Mormon. Her mom is pretty opposed, but after dinner we played catch phrase and then we said that we had to go, but her mom insisted that we stay....must have been my charm, haha. For the most part, this past week was a little bit slower than usual. A lot of people were out of town so it was a little bit difficult to schedule and get appointments. The investigators that we saw this week were the 9 year old and another man that is dating a less active. They both went great and we left the commitment for the 9 year old to pray for a baptism date. We see her tonight so we will see how everything pans out. We have interviews again with Pres. Ely this next week so there could be a possibility that I could find out where I will be next transfer. I think I will stay in Fort Collins, but you never know. Oh, so crazy story of the week…we have been wanting to get info on the family history center at the stake center for awhile and last week we finally got around to it. After we got all the information, the first person that we street contacted was doing a bunch of family history work and needed help. It was like a mini miracle! It was crazier if you were there.
Elder Cooper

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hello Everyone! First of all, since I won't be able to email later in the week, Happy Thanksgiving. Sounds like things are going to be a blast this year. My companion and I have a couple of dinner appointments on Thanksgiving so we will definitely be full by the end of Thursday (by the way, we get dinner appointments every night so we are a little spoiled). This past week has been a blast and has been one of the most successful weeks of my mission. We ended up getting 4 new investigators and that has yet to happen on my mission and in the area I'm serving for the last year until now! 2 of them are member referrals, 1 from tracting, and a 9 year old so they came from all different sources. Since we got so many new investigators this week we have had the most lessons with those investigators that I have ever had. It is really exciting to see them grow as well as to see myself grow as we share messages of the gospel. Yesterday, we were going to teach a less active member and his non-member wife and when I walked in the Charger/Bronco game was on and I couldn't help but see the complete domination that the Chargers had pulled off! Go Chargers! Anyway, we had Zone Conference this last week up in Laramie. It wasn't as good as the last Zone Conference, but it was still awesome. Our mission president did leave us with a commitment to read the Book of Mormon in a month as well as highlight all the references to Jesus Christ, his words, and his attributes so it’s pretty intense. We have a Christmas Devotional this next month too. The only downside to this week was that I had to get my bike fixed....again. The bike is truly a curse, but we have a member in the ward who works on bikes and he fixes them for the missionaries for free, so that is rad. Next week I am going to get some Christmas cards to send out, well hopefully. I did end up buying myself an early Christmas present from Toys-R-Us. I bought Risk. We have been playing it a lot on p-days and I wanted to get one haha. In fact we are going to go play it with a couple of members after we get done here in the library. I'm glad that everything is going well with the new baby. Not much else is going on. Well, there is always stuff going on, but it’s similar missionary work stuff. It’s awesome to hear that all is well. HAPPY THANKSGIVING.
Elder Cooper
P.S. Probably not this week, but in the next week or two I will be sending my Journal entries to you from the first day I entered the MTC to now (Yep I write in my journal every day)

...the work in the area is finally starting to pick up

That’s so awesome that Allie had her baby this last week! It was funny because during the week, some family in that ward was talking to me about my family and asked if I had any nieces or nephews and at that point I said I might or I might not, haha. That’s great that the delivery went well and thanks for sending some pictures. So, I thought that people celebrated Christmas early back home...there are 2 families in our ward that we have visited that already have their trees up! Maybe it is because of the snow. It snowed this weekend but cleared up the next day so a lot of it has already melted. Today is pretty exciting because we have 2 appointments with investigators. Since I have been out that has never happened. One is with a guy that we tracted into and the other is with a 9 year old. It has been nice lately because the work in our area is finally starting to pick up. This week is zone conference as well so that’s always a spiritual booster for the transfer. It is up in Laramie, Wyoming so it’s probably going to be freezing. It’s another 1000 feet above where we are. That’s good that the mission pres. sent you a letter about Christmas packages because I would have probably forgotten. I can't believe that it is already half way through November. I can't say enough how fast time goes by. Well, thanks for keeping me posted on all the crazy things that are going on back home. Go Chargers!
Love, Elder Cooper