Weekly Letter

Dear Family and Friends.

I hope this makes it to all of you, we are having trouble with our yahoo account that we normally use, so we are trying gmail tonight. We also apologize for not sending a letter out last week. We were sitting in an airport last Sunday and didn't have a laptop to use. When we got home on Monday afternoon we had an assignment to find a place to live for a new set of sister missionaries coming to serve in Oakland, then we just lost track of time. We'll catch up tonight.

We had a busy week two weeks ago.  We started with our weekly trip to Morgantown to feed the Young Single Adults.We had a sandwich bar for them. It wasn't a real good turnout, but those that came really enjoyed it. We drove back to Oakland Tuesday night then got up Wednesday and went back past Morgantown on our way to the airport in Pittsburgh to fly to Lora's graduation in Bismarck, North Dakota. Lora was at the airport to greet us and it was really good to see her again.  As most of you know by now, Lora graduated from the University of Mary with her doctorate in Occupational Therapy.  On Thursday Lora presented her Capstone project.  She got the highest marks on all of the judged categories.  That was her final hurdle for graduation. On Friday Kristy and Karlee joined us.  It was really fun for us to have family with us for the weekend. Saturday morning was her hooding ceremony. That's the thing they hang around your neck to show that you have received your doctorate degree.  It was short and sweet. Saturday  afternoon was the university graduation ceremony where she walked and received her diploma. It was cool when they announced her name as Doctor Lora Collins. That ceremony was neither short nor sweet, but it was fun to be there to support her at this special time.

We flew out of Bismarck on Sunday afternoon with a six-hour layover in Minneapolis and then on to Pittsburgh.  As we were about to land in Minneapolis, we had a little scare.  It was really windy as we approached the runway and just before the wheels touched down the pilot throttled back up and we basically took off again.  The pilot said there was some strong wind shear and it wasn't safe to land.  We went on a big loop and tried it again.  The second time worked.  It was a little scary.

As we were waiting in the Minneapolis airport, we got a call from our mission president.  He actually called while we were in the air so we had a message that he called.  Our first thought was, why is he calling us now? Were we getting a new assignment?  It turns out he told us he was assigning a set of sister missionaries to serve in Oakland and he needed our help finding them an apartment.  On Monday the senior missionary over housing called and asked for us to help find an apartment they could move into by Saturday. We went to work and by the end of the day we had a potential place for them.  We met with the property manager and arranged a walk-through the next day.  We did an inspection and it looked good so we got back with Elder Lawson and he finished the paperwork.  We moved the sisters into their new apartment on Saturday.  They called us the Oakland miracle makers.  We have a set of really good sister missionaries, both from Utah.  Sister Stay is from Orem, she lives just south of Mountain View High School.  Sister Shurger is from Roosevelt.

James and Joy and the kids came to see us on Friday and Saturday.  They had been in Virginia for a Bouchard family reunion.  They arranged to fly out of Pittsburg so they could come by and visit us on their way home.  It was so fun to see those little grandkids again, and Joy and James too. We had some good visits, good food and fun at the arcaded place.It was hard to see them leave.

We went to the Flannagans for dinner on Saturday with the new sister missionaries.  We had a great meal of spaghetti and meatballs, garlic bread and Ceasar salad and some Amish Chocolate Chip Banana Bread that Joy and James brought to us.

Mom actually had a young woman attend class today.  She was actually a visitor, but a young woman nonetheless!  The sister missionaries were there also.  I taught the Sunday School lesson today.

I love King Benjamin's address to his people found in the first five chapters of Mosiah.  There is so much powerful doctrine in those few chapters.  My scripture tonight is from Mosiah 2:41. It says, "And moreover, I would desire that ye should consider on the blessed and happy state of those that keep the commandments of God.  For behold, they are blessed in all things, both temporal and spiritual; and if they hold out faithful to the end they are received into heaven, that thereby they may dwell with God in a state of never-ending happiness.  Oh remember, remember that these things are true; for the Lord God hath spoken it."  Pay attention, this is powerful.  This doesn't mean that we are going to get all the blessings we want immediately, but God has promised us that we will be blessed for our obedience, whether immediately or later on.  The biggest blessing for our obedience is to live with God in a state of never-ending happiness. I also love it when they repeat words or phrases. In this case the word is remember. Obedience is not a burden, it is a great blessing.

That's all for this week.  We love you and pray for you daily.

Love,

Mom and Dad

Grandma and Grandad

Jamee and Kerry

Elder and Sister Cooper