Snow Before Halloween :(

Hi everyone, how's it going? I hope you are all having a fun Halloween! It is super cold here! we have gotten about 4 inches of snow this past weekend. people everywhere were telling us that we were supposed to get 8 to 12 inches but we only got 4 so that was good. This week was pretty good we did an exchange with the Glenville Sisters and that was really good we all had a good time and learned from each other. I went to Glenville so I got to meet some of there investigators and do some finding up there while Sister Hale and Woodmansee were here in Bennington. We have been doing a lot of finding this past week and we have come close to picking up some new people to teach. we have a referral that we are excited about we just have to find a time when we can meet with them. we hope that it all works out and we can teach them. Today we have P-day and then we have to stay in our apartments for Halloween. Halloween is not a good night for missionary work :( but we have a lot that we can be doing at home. we have to do the training in our district meeting this week so we have to prepare for that.... I hope it goes well! oh and this Saturday is transfer call. I am not sure what is going to happen with that but I am pretty confident that I will be staying here for my last transfer.The question is if I will be staying with Sister Hale or not. well, I guess we will find our soon. I hope you all have a great Halloween and I will write again next week! --Sister Cox

Fall is in the Air!

(e-mail from 10/24/11)

Hello!! how is everyone doing?? I am doing great!! The weather here is really chilly and crisp! it feels like fall! I just hope that the snow holds off for a bit. that would make me happy!! :) this week we had a funeral for one of our members here, it was good very spiritual. we also had to drive to Saratoga springs this week for district meeting, which we were not to happy about! We normally have our meeting in Greenwich, NY but now they want us to switch off every other week. It takes up a big chunk of our day, it is and hour and a half drive there then we have a meeting of and hour and a half and then it is and hour and a half back. it is a long day of driving! oh, well we are still doing good on our miles for the months so that is a good thing. we are doing an exchange with Glenville Sisters this week! I am excited for that. it is always good to work with others and learn from them! well that is about it. I hope you all have a great week! do forget to wish mom a Happy Birthday on Saturday! --Sister Cox

Fall is FINALLY getting here!

(e-mail from 10/11/11)

Hello everyone! How was your week? I had a pretty good week! Sorry about no email last week. I will repent. First thing is that we found some new people to teach this week so that was really good. one of them was kind of a miraculous that we found him. one day we were walking home and our mission pres. called us and told us he wanted us to look up this former record because he has just got off the phone with an Elder that has served here in 2007, well his dad past away and apparently his dad grew up here and new the former quite well. so this Elder wanted to get his information to tell him that his dad past away. so we ended up going over to the formers house and talked to him for about an hour. it was a good talk and we are going to start teaching him! it was an amazing experience I know that we were lead by the Lord to find him. this week we also has Stake Conference! it was really really good. A lot of the talks were centered on missionary work! :) This week we are looking forward to Zone Conference Elder Piper of the seventy is coming! and the leaves have finally started to change!! they are not that good this year some say that it was because off all the water and the flooding and some says its because of the warm and then cool and then warm weather we have been having. I am not sure which it is but they are pretty still, just not as good as last years. bummer :( oh, well still it prettier than anything I have seen in the west! well I hope you all have a good week! --Sister Cox

Starting to look like fall here

(e-mail from 9/12/11)

Hey, how is everyone doing? It is starting to look like fall around here. the leaves are starting to change! its crazy how fast the time flies! This week was good. We had an awesome district meeting with our mission President and then we also had interviews this week, that went well. We also did exchanges with the Glenville Sisters. I was fun. I got to go to Glenville work with Sister Woodmansee.I have gotten to do a lot of exchanges with Sister Woodmansee a lot on my mission because we always seem to end up in areas that are right be each other. it was good to catch up and work together again. its crazy because we actually live right by each other she lives right above Lehi and we ended up going to the same Jr. high and High school. we both lived in Orem area and then moved to Lehi area! What a small world. anyway it was good and we had a lot of fun. we found a new investigator this week so that was good and we are still working with some amazing people, we cant wait till they are baptized! I hope that Sister Hale and I are both here when that happens but if we are or not it will be great when they do get baptized! anyway I hope you all have a great week! --Sister Cox

The Gospel Brings Light and Hope

Hello everyone, how has the week been? I hear that it is getting colder there and it is getting colder here too. this week, as many of you know has been difficult. We had a recent tragedy in our mission. Last week 2 sisters in our mission got into a car accident, Sister Love and Sister Bentley. Sister Love and Sister Bentley were life flighted to hospitals in the area. Sister Love sustained injuries that put her in critical condition and Sister Bentley did not make it through the night. It has been very hard for all of us in the mission. Sister Love is out of the hospital and is now recovering at home. they say that her recovery will take 6 to 8 weeks. the whole situation has been really sad for all of us in the mission. Sister Love was my companions MTC companion and I knew sister Bentley from doing exchanges, we have been out on our missions about the same time, she came out one transfer after me. she was an awesome missionary and a wonderful person. I know that the Lord has a plan for her and she is continuing the Lords work on the other side. our prayers have been with Sister Bentley's family and sister Love and her family. Its things like this that you never think will happen so close to you. But it has given me the opportunity to stop and think about how much the Gospel brings us hope and light in times of darkness. I am so very grateful for the knowledge that I have. I can see so much tragedy and darkness in the world and it makes me want to share the Gospel more and help others find the peace and hope that it brings, especially in times of darkness. I know that our Heavenly Father has a plan for all of us. He has a plan for Sister Bentley on the other side. I am grateful for the opportunity I have had to serve next to such a great servant of the Lord. I am grateful for this time in my life to devote it to the service of the Lord. --Sister Cox

A Tragic Loss. Prayers Needed.

Two sister missionaries from Sister Cox's mission were involved in a car accident yesterday. Sister Bentley passed away, Sister Love is in the hospital. Please pray for Sister Love and the families of these sisters. I'm sure it is extremely difficult for the mission president, his wife, and the missionaries as well.

Here are some articles with more info:

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/700175258/Sister-missionary-dies-in-NY-car-accident.html

http://www.wwnytv.com/news/local/Arizona-Woman-Seriously-Injured-In-Lisbon-Crash-128705828.html

Earthquakes, Hurricanes, Tropical Storms... Oh My!

Hey everyone! How has your week been?!! Things have been really really crazy here!! we have been moving this week and it has been exhausting!!!! I was so tired and we still have to put our new apartment back together and clean the old one! some of the exciting highlights of this week was that I felt my first earthquake!!! :) It was awesome!! it was not a very big one apparently it was just a after shock from a earthquake that they had in Virgina. We were just sitting in the car waiting for district meeting to start and the car started moving like some one was shaking it. I turned to sister Hale and asked her what in the world she was doing, she said "nothing, it you! look your leg is moving!" I told her that my leg is moving because the whole car was moving but she insisted that it was me! we were joking around and we said maybe it was a ghost or maybe it was an earthquake. and as it turns out it was an earthquake! crazy!! It was exciting though, I have always wanted to feel one, not a big one or a scary one but just to feel what they are like! it was pretty cool.

So then as the week went on we heard that there was supposed to be a hurricane that was coming. at first I was really skeptical on if it was really going to be that bad. I figure we are not that close to the cost and the storm has to break up some what when it hits land. but people keep telling us that it was going to be really bad and that in Vermont they are mostly worried about all the trees. This hurricane winds it would cause a lot of damage. at the time we were more concerned about finishing the move than the hurricane. but by Saturday morning we though we better go get some drinking water to be prepared just in case. so we went to the store and the water was completely wiped out! all of it! so we went to plan B we filled all our pots and pans with water and put them in the fridge. and then we just stayed in and waited for the storm to pass. and then it rained and rained and rained and rained and rained some more. no wind though. we didn't know that it had down graded to a tropical storm at that point we were just thinking this is the lamest hurricane in history. so we spent most of Sunday trying to get our apartment back together. it was late afternoon when we heard some of our neighbors talking or more like yelling out side. we were listening in and they said something about evacuating and so we ran out there to ask them. they told us that a fire truck cam by and told them that they were evacuating our whole street because of the fear of flooding. that is when things got interesting. we were not sure where to go. we gathered a few things and put them in the car and then we called a few people. we finally found a place to go, one of the members in the branch and we ended up staying the night there. they were really nice and they live well above Bennington so we were good there. in the morning we cam back about 8 and drove around to look at the the damage. almost all the bridges are washed out or closed the Walmart is muddy and flooded and I hear some of the grocery stores down that way are covered in water too. there is talk of our water being our for a while because when one of the bridges fell it fell on a main water pipe. I really, really hope that does not happen. but other than that everything was fine. our apartment was fine nothing flooded and it could have been a lot worse that it was. I am sure life will be back to normal in no time. there are a lot of places that are in a lot more trouble that us. there are some place in New York that they are worried about dams breaking I am sure that everyone will be ok, they have already evacuated people. but yes so that was our exciting week. I hope you guys have a good week this week and I am sure we sill have a better week here, ---Sister Cox