Carter, Cohen

Hiiiii friends and family I miss you all so so so much! Its been such an amazing time and I’m grateful for the opportunity I have to serve the Lord over the Holidays! I hope everyone enjoyed the Christmas season! This truth is i really don't remember whats been happening the days are a blur but the work is amazing! My companion and I are laughing all day and working our butts off. Sometimes we dont always see the results that we are expecting and want, but our Heavenly Father knows what these people need and the work is paying off! Its unbelievably wild that I finished my 4th transfer which means im technically hitting 6 month on Wednesday I’ve been overwhelmed with gratitude this Christmas season as I’ve spend the Holidays as my Savior did during his time on earth. I find comfort that he was walking the streets teaching and being rejected just as I am. I’ve found a new love and new meaning of the Christmas season! The Lord is looking for ways to bless us! I was just thinking this ...

Hiiiiii everyone!!! I hope things are amazing at home! Im gonna make this one short. I could write a novel but nobody has time for that. This week was seriously amazing though! We had the baptism of Pedro and Maria Nereyda and their two kids Renata and Manuel! Such an extremely special experience to help a family become eternal! These are truly special people!  We had hilarious stories this week but numero uno on that list is the fact that we locked our keys in the house. Super big L. My companion and I are having the best time. We're always laughing but doing the Lords work at the same time! Sorry for the short email this week but the last thing I want to share as the Christmas season has arrived is a message of LOVE! "Love one another as I have loved you". Lets make this Christmas about someone else. Serve someone! Love a little bit harder! Thats what Christmas is ALL ABOUT!!! Love you more than you know! And more than that Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ do too!!!

These past couple weeks have been truly amazing! Ive enjoyed being a trainer but more importantly Ive loved learning how I can be a better companion, friend and leader! I feel as though I’m learning more than my companion which might be a problem but I’m trying to work on that. It’s been awesome as well to be able to speak better spanish and truly understand and get to know these people personally! First and foremost funny story #1! We are so truly blessed to eat with members each and every day. They are so unbelievably kind and I can’t speak highly enough about the people here. BUT that also means sometimes you're going to have to eat things that you don't particularly love. That may have happened yesterday. Mole is not something that sits very well with me, but our mole was topped with old fried banana amd pork that I couldnt even chew. The Hermana's here give food quite liberally as well. A whole plate later CHUGGING my coke get it down... I finished. But its rude to not...

Whatssss up everyone! Sorry its been a while! But YES I’m still alive! What a crazy couple weeks its been! This week is tranfers and I JUST RECIEVED the news on what the next part of my mission will look like... DUN DUN DUHHHH It has been so amazing to watch the work progress here. At times I’ve felt as though I’m not making any sort of impact, but I know without a shadow of a doubt the Lord is making an impact on so many people here in Oaxaca! I also know for a fact my life and this mission are in the hands of the Lord as well! But lets get into the fun stuff! As I’ve been here I’ve felt as though I’m getting used to all the weird stuff that happens. BUT my very favorite part of the past couple weeks happened this past Saturday and Sunday! As we were walking the streets as usual we see someone calling us over to talk! This doesn’t happen very often and when we get to the other side of the street WE MEET PEDRO!!! Pedro has down syndrome and only understands the native dialec from here....

Sorry again! The truth is last week was a tough one and I didn't feel up for writing an email but thats okay thats how a mission goes and life as well!!! I don’t have much to tell, but this week was awesome! I had to go to Oaxaca again because I’m a doofus and lost my green card... so there goes Tuesday and Wednesday and then we were smooth sailing from there! There were so many amazing experiences this week and I can’t believe I’m coming to and end of my training!   I’d love to share an experience very fast! I see miracles every day in my mission but I didnt just see this miracle it slapped me in the face. I’ve been struggling knowing what to do and plan for each day. And we stopped by a kids house that we have been teaching, but is honestly just super busy. We stopped by and his Uncle said he had just left for a party and wasn't coming back. We were with a member (his name is Jesus he's such a legend) and he has a car. We get in the car and he suggests we say a prayer. We...

Myyyy apologies everyone! I kinda lost track of time last week. This week was sooo awesome, it literally flew by. If anyone was wondering I actually am learning spanish!!! They gave us a language test in the MTC and we retake it every 3 months or so. In the MTC I scored an overwhelming 2.0 lowest in the class. I was quite upset about it if Im being honest but hey thats alright. AND THEN this week I retook that baby, fresh start and got a 5.2! They say if you score a 7 you’re fluent. Lets say I'm not close to being fluent, but it feels so amazing to know your efforts are paying off! We had a ward activity this week and one of the ward members really wanted us to come over and make sure the projector would work. We ended up watching Michael Jackson music videos for a good 20 minutes! So awesome to see the cutest little 2 year old get jiggy wit it to some MJ! The past couple weeks have been full of highs and lows and at some moments I've been generally really sad or upset. But my ...

 A WEEK OF MIRICALES! This email could be a couple pages long but I wont do that to you guys. I know you got pages of other missionary emails to get to. FIRST AND FOREMOST QUEEN CREEK ARIZONA TEMPLE!!! Lets goooooo! The next thing... for those of you who don’t  know where Im serving my Mission, I'm in Oaxaca Mexico, and more specifically the area Juchitan de Zaragoza. There probably aren’t many people who know or care where the heck Juchitan de Zaragoza is, but I do know the LORD CARES! The first new Temple announced out of 17 was the Juchitan de Zaragoza Temple! When the Prophet announced the Temple my companion and I just instantley look at each other and our jaws dropped, but for some odd reason not a single person in the church where we were watching reacted... quite odd for such BIG news. Heres what happened... My comp and I were listening with airpods in (or as every mom and dad calls them "Earpods") English. But the translator in Spanish messed up and didn’t say th...