Weekly Letter

Dear Family and Friends,

One more week come and gone. We hope this letter finds you all well and happy.  We had a good week this week.  We had a Tri-Zone Conference on Tuesday in Charleston.  Since it is a long drive, about 3 1/2 hours each way, we decided to travel down Monday afternoon and spend the night there. We can drive seven hours in a day, but since we don't have to we chose not to.  We really enjoyed the conference.  We had opening remarks by Sister and President Lyndahl and then split up into break-out sessions to receive instruction.  One of the most impressive things to us is that the break-out sessions are all taught by the zone leaders and Sister zone leaders, and they all did an excellent job.  We are really impressed by their knowledge of the gospel and their strong testimonies of Jesus Christ. Our training all centered on using the attributes of Christ to be better missionaries.  After the break-out sessions we met together again and received more instruction from Pres. Lyndahl.  Then they had all the missionaries that were leaving for home on the next transfer bare their testimonies. We then had pizza for lunch, visited with the other senior missionary couples and headed home.

Last week we visited with the director of the West Virginia University LDS Institute in Morgantown while we were there for District Council meeting.  The senior couple that had been serving there went home around Christmas and they don't have any new couples scheduled to come anytime soon.  We asked if they could use our help and they enthusiastically said yes.  We talked with Pres. Lyndahl if it would be okay for us to do that and he gave us his approval. So each Tuesday we will travel down to Morgantown and prepare dinner for the students and visit with them before their class starts.  We are really excited to have another assignment. We will start this Tuesday. They do have a budget for the meals so it's not coming out of our pocket.

Wednesday we took dinner to the Flanagans. Brian Flanagan is our friend that has been falling quite a bit lately and on top of that he came down with bronchitis. His wife Kim is a counselor at a troubled youth facility and is working long hours at the beginning of a new session and is worn out when she gets home.  They invite us to dinner often and we wanted to help them out by taking them dinner.  We took them chili and cornbread and they really liked it, especially the cornbread. 

Thursday was our regular day at the hospital. We are glad the hospital is close because we have had more snow and freezing rain over the last week.  Much of the snow we get is more of an icy snow. It's slick for a while, but they do a pretty good job of keeping the main roads cleared.

Friday was our normal District Counsel meeting.  This week we took them blonde brownies for treats and they were a hit. We went to Cracker Barrel for dinner and that was yummy. It's nice to be in Morgantown where they have lots of options for places to eat.

Saturday we delivered birthday cards and candy bars. We got Idaho Spud candy bars for Christmas and thought that would be a novel candy bar from Idaho missionaries.  We have heard back from a couple of people and the Idaho Spuds seem to be a hit.

We had a nice surprise at church today.  Mom has a cousin named Valerie Wride who lives in Virginia. Her son has a cabin on the lake and was there with his family and some friends. They came to our church meetings today.  When Mom was sustained as Young Women's President, he recognized her name and came up to introduce himself.  We had a nice visit with him.  His sons, and a couple of friends blessed and passed the sacrament.  Hopefully we will get Valerie to come with him occasionally. Valerie was Mom's best friend cousin when they were young.

I love this scripture in Proverbs 3:5-6, "Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.  In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths."  As we go through life we have to make a lot of hard decisions, not sure sometimes what to do.  We don't have all the answers, but He does. Trust in the Lord, he will guide you.

Have a great week. We love you and pray for you daily.

Love,

Mom and Dad

Grandma and Grandad

Jamee and Kerry

Sister and Elder Cooper

The Wride Family and Elders Denning, Jensen, Kakazu