Christmas Week 2015

Christmas Week:

This week has been awesome. I guess I'll start off with Christmas. We woke up i the morning, opened presents (Thank you everyone for everything that was super fun!), played Uno and some of our other games we got with the other missionaries in the house. Then we went to a members for lunch, ate a thanksgiving turkey meal and some pie, went to Bishop Kilgore's and skyped our families which was awesome!, And went to the Dickson's and had Christmas dinner with them, one of their neighbors, and The Dopo's(An African family in the ward). And between those things stopping by members and sharing Christmas messages. 

And then one of my favorite parts of the day was we gathered up some of the gifts we'd been given ( a few small toys, games, lots of candy and food) and put it in a big bag and took it to the Manirakiza family. Their dad is Pierre the one who just got baptized and he had to quit his job to come to church so they are struggling financially a little. When the kids opened the door and we said we had a present 8 little African kids appeared out of no where and started sending tissue paper flying over our heads as they opened the bag of presents. It wasn't anything fancy but they were so pumped about it. That made my Christmas.

The missionary work flame is also catching in Cedar Rapids. It has always been here and the members are awesome at working with us, but since Elder Martino came and we have been working more with them on finding their friends who could use the gospel by asking who has recently had a life changing event like a birth or a death, a move, or even struggling with a teenager. People pull out their phones and start looking through their contacts and face book friends and think about whose life the gospel could bless. The answer of course is everyone, but those who have been prepared to receive it have started coming to the surface and it's amazing to see.

Also on Sunday Pierre received the Priesthood and is going to be baptizing his wife and 3 kids this Saturday. His daughter just turned 8 on Sunday. God definitely has had his hand in that families life and has been preparing them to be great contributors to the Kingdom of God. 

Love you all have a great New Year talk to ya in 2016

Love Elder Cox

This was the food from our primary's "Christmas for the Elders". Best day of my life

This is the only picture I got of opening presents. It's a meat and cheese package but you can't tell that because I'm a genius and held the package backwards so all you can see is the nutrition facts. And I'm also wearing my sweet new cashmere scarf. Thanks Courtney and McKay!

Hey everyone! So yesterday we didn't get to email because there was an ice storm so the library shut down so I'm emailing today. But I decided that since it's been a long time since I've actually sent pictures home (partly because my camera got stolen partly because I'm still terrible at taking pictures) I'll start off with pictures this week. For you mom.

And playing Uno Christmas morning

And this was our backyard this morning after the snow/ice storm. 2 days ago the grass was still green and it looked like September.