Where is Cooper Boice now?

Have you been enjoying Cooper's missionary blog?  We hope so!
He absolutely loved serving a full-time mission in Argentina.

Ever wonder where he is now or what he's up to?
After his mission, he returned to BYU and graduated with a degree in Business Finance!

While at BYU, he was the Captain of the Ranger competition team in BYU's prestigious Army ROTC program.  He won marksmanship competitions and received several 1st place awards during Basic Training in South Carolina.  He was commissioned as an officer in the Army and now serves as a Lieutenant (Combat Engineer) in the National Guard, stationed in Phoenix, Arizona.

(Cooper with his goofy brothers)

He worked for the NSA and is now teaching the "Spy Escape and Evasion" classes that were recently featured on the popular TV show "Shark Tank".   He is loving his life!

Most recently, Cooper and his mom (author Trina Boice) wrote a fun book together!
It has dating advice for single guys, as well as marriage advice for men who want to understand how their wives think.

Thank you for sharing your love and support with Cooper!

Cooper's Homecoming!

                                                    Woohoo!  Cooper is home!!!
Surrounded by loving family and friends, banners, signs, custom t-shirts, helium baloons, smiles and tears, Elder Cooper Boice returned home to us after serving for 2 years in Argentina.  He heard chants of "Coop!  Coop!  Coop!" as he floated down the escalator and saw the big crowd excitedly waiting for him.

Cooper has now earned membership in the prestigious "Beautiful Feet Club", members of the family who have served full-time missions for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, based on the scripture in Romans 10:15 "How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things."

Cooper grew an inch, earned a nice Argentine tan and is more handsome than ever! 

Cooper said that coming home from serving a mission is like going to Disneyland the day your dog dies....  We're thrilled to have him home again, but we know it was hard for him to leave the people and Lord's work that he had come to love for 2 years.

A surprised Cooper saw a new blue car in the driveway with a big yellow ribbon (colors of the flag of Argentina, of course) as a special gift from his proud parents!

We're so proud of Cooper and feel honored to have experienced his mission through his sweet letters and photos over the 24 months.  Thank you for sharing this "Scoop de Coop" with us!  We hope you've enjoyed it as much as we have!

It's appropriate that Cooper comes home at Easter time as we celebrate the resurrection of our Savior who Cooper represented as His servant.  What a thrill it has been to send a boy out on a mission and watch a man return who has sacrificed 2 years of his life and taught others about Jesus Christ, all the while becoming more like Him.  
                                                     Welcome Home Elder Boice!

Coop's last letter from Argentina!

(Editor's note:  This picture cracks me up because Cooper did a lot of these Jedi photos when he was in the MTC and it looks like he still thinks they're cool.  For any of you who would like to welcome Coop home, he'll be arriving at the Las Vegas airport at 9:00 am on March 31st.  YAY!!!)

Hi family,

It´s been a good week. We´ve had some great lessons. A family the other day gave us a bag of grapefruit after we taught them the Restoration. And since it´s difficult to enter people´s houses here we´ve been trying to give as many Books of Mormon away as possible, me especially since I don´t have much time left.

Well, the moment has finally arrived. This is the last time I´ll write to you guys on the mission. I now officially have less than a week left and my time to serve the Lord 24 hours a day will be coming to an end. And I guess I feel the same things every missionary probably feels. "If only I had more time...there´s so much to do"

The mission is the best thing that ever happened to me and I´ve loved it. Even if I had spent 2 years as a missionary and no one had ever accepted the restored gospel it would have been a wonderful experience to follow the Lord´s footsteps and be rejected. But I´ve been blessed with seeing people change their lives and entering the waters of baptism, making a covenant with the Lord and taking great steps of faith!

Yesterday I gave my last district meeting and we talked about faith. Trying to teach faith isn´t easy. In fact I´m pretty sure the only way you can learn what faith is is on your feet and not in a classroom. There´s things that I was able to learn by serving a mission that I don´t think I could ever have learned otherwise. Who knows, maybe years down the road, but I got to learn it now at the beginning of my life instead of at the end. I´m super grateful for the blessing of serving a mission.

I guess I´ll have plenty of time to think about it and to tell you guys about it in less than a week. Someone told me a couple weeks ago that as missionaries we don´t realize the change in us until after the mission, becuase its gradual and day by day, and it won´t be until we go home that we realize how we´ve changed. I hope that´s true, I guess I´ll find out in a little while.

I´ll probably be leaving a lot of my clothes for a kid in my ward here who leaves on his mission in about a month. He needs white shirts and stuff to serve his mission in Venezuela.  And no I won´t be sending any boxes home. 

Oh, and as for a welcome home dinner. You know what sounds really good? Remember when the missionaries would come over to our house for dinner and you would make those chicken wrap-up things? I can´t remember if that´s what their called, but you know it has chicken inside and it´s wrapped in some kind of dough and then you pour gravy on it. Well my missionary stomach thinks that that would be really good.

Thanks for being such a great and supportive family. There are missionaries out here who´s families aren´t even members of the church.

Ok well I´ll talk to you guys in a week, see you in the airport!

Love,

Elder Boice

March 17, 2010

Hi family,


Last night we got back from a special 2-day zone conference in the mission home, which was a lot of fun. I´ll start with last Thursday and tell about the week.

We had a good lesson with the Ortiz family. They´re an older couple and the wife doesn´t understand too much when she reads and the husband doesn´t know how to read so we´ve been teaching them at a lot slower rate. They´re really nice though and there´s a member family that helps us out with them. We had a priesthood activity that we planned with the ward mission leader on Thursday. It was going to include going out and visiting families, dedicating Books of Mormon to give to friends, and of course food. But no one showed up, not even the ward mission leader that planned and announced it. I think if I started the mission over again I would do less activities, they don´t work too well in Argentina.

On Sunday I had one of those moments where you get called to give a talk in sacrament meeting and the time you have to plan it is the time it takes you to walk to the podium. Haha it wasn´t too bad though.

Then on Monday we got up early and our zone travelled to Rosario to the mission home for a special Zone Conference. The day was filled with workshops, classes, and tons of games and activities outside. I also had my last interview with the mission president. We talked about what I learned in the mission, and what I´m planning on doing afterwards. He gave me good advice and counsel for after the mission more than anything. And I finally got my temple recommend renewed, yay. It´s in spanish which is cool.

On Tuesday morning we woke up early and we all played capture the flag around the mission home, then we ate and had more workshops, scripture knowledge games, and listened to the President and his wife. As a tradition, the missionaries that are finishing always share their testimony in their last zone conference. It´s known as your "deathtimony", and I gave mine yesterday.

We got back to our areas last night, and so now I´ve just got about a week and a half to work my butt off. Something funny the mission president told me. He said "Elder Boice you´re looking skinny, good job you´ve got to leave everything you´ve got in the mission." Haha well anyway, I better go and try to leave everything I´ve got.

I love you all, have a great week. And I can´t remember if I wished Bo a happy birthday last week. So if not, HAPPY BIRTHDAY BO!!!!!!!



Love,

Elder Boice

March 20, 2010

(Editor's note:  Since Cooper didn't send any new pictures this week I thought I'd share with you a design Cooper's cousin is working on for the t-shirts we're all going to wear at the airport when Coop comes home to surprise him.  When Cooper was really young he drew a cute picture of a bird wearing a sombrero.  We thought he'd get a kick out of that on the Argentina flag where normally their yellow sun design would go.  Only 21 days until Coop comes home!  Woohoo!)


Hi family,


I don´t have too much time to write. But we´ve found some good people this week. We went with a member (from our second area) this week and we taught a family with him that he gave us as a referral. It´s an older couple, and they were really receptive. Who knows if all goes well there´s still enough time that I could see their baptism before I leave. We found another family as well which seems to be really good. The dad wants us to help him stop drinking alcohol, and the 8-year-old daughter says she wants to go to church because she wants to know everything about God. :)

There´s been some rough moments in the week, but that´s good I guess because when things are tougher you learn faster right?

I´ve been thinking the last couple days about what I´ve learned in the mission so far. I´m really grateful for the 2 years I´ve had to serve a mission. There´s things that would have taken me years and years to learn and things that I may never have learned without the mission.

This next week on Monday and Tuesday we´re going to have a special zone conference in the mission home and we´re going to stay there for like a day and a half. I´m looking forward to it. We did the same thing last year and I hear it´s really good from the Elders whose zones have already gone. It´s gonna be my last interview with the president I think, which means he´s gonna probably talk to me about after the mission stuff. Weird. Ok well until next week. I love you family! Cuídensen (take care).

Love,

Elder Boice
 

March 2, 2010

(Cooper's shoe....Poor baby)

Hi family,


We´ve had a good week. In summary, we basically started from scratch in our area looking for all new investigators. Our area is pretty central city, lots of intercom doorbells (we call them "quien es" boxes) so it´s not quite as easy to get in houses and teach here. We´re pretty much knocking doors most of our days and trying to work out some more creative things like giving a presentation in a school etc... We´ve been giving out more Books of Mormon than I think I ever have before in my mission just because I´m trying to concentrate more on that.  My companion is really good at talking to people, which is good cuz I´m just pretty straightforward a lot of the time, haha. So yeah I hope we can be a force for good. I feel like I´m doing everything I can, and I´m determined to make March the best month of my mission. Which means there will probably be plenty of barriers...

I´ll tell a couple of stories from the week. On Thursday we went by a guy named Miguel. We had contacted him 2 days before and at first he didn´t want anything but then we started talking and he´s been having a lot of problems (hasn´t been able to find a job in a long time, etc.). We gave him a Book of Mormon and promised him that if he read and prayed and put God first that God would give him more help. And when we went by on Thursday he told us that he just got back from work. We said "you´re working now?" and he said that he read the Book of Mormon the morning after we gave it to him and that night someone called him to give him a job.

Another cool thing that happened this week is that we actually got into an apartment by talking to someone through the intercom! That´s the first time it worked! haha. We´re not teaching that many lessons a week right now but we did have a couple good days and got into a couple houses. On Sunday a bunch of missionaries in the zone came and worked in our area in the afternoon, and we just divided up and knocked doors and contacted people. We found a few good people who listened. One guy is Jewish and I´m excited to teach him.

Another cool experience was that we decided in our planning to have a family home evening with a family in our ward. We couldn´t get ahold of them the night before, but the day of we ran into the mom in the street and told her we wanted to do it that night. She said that that was perfect because the night before she told her whole family that they needed to start doing Family Home Evening the next day. And the next day we found her and told her we wanted to help. They brought their neighbor who isn´t a member and it went well.

Funny experiences of the week: Some kids tried to scare us by setting off a big firecracker behind us in the street. And last night it rained a ton and we lost power in our house right when we walked inside, and the other Elders in my district got flooded in their house. Which is impressive because their house is like 3 feet above street level and has a 1 foot wall in front of their door to prevent flooding.  Let me tell you it´s not easy to cook in the dark! I tried to make a sandwich last night haha and it took me about 10 minutes to do.

About the recent Chilean earthquake...No I didn´t feel anything, but our bishop told us that at like 2 or 3 in the morning you could see the street lights here rocking back and forth. There are a lot of missionaries in our mission from Chile however and the majority are from Santiago. My hijo, Elder Chamorro is from Concepción, Chile, and I heard it hit there even harder. I haven´t talked to him however but apparently our mission president got in contact with all the Chilean Elders families and I think some Elders called home to see if everyone was ok.

I have a new email account now. It´s cooper.boice@myldsmail.net  Yeah I know I won´t be using it for very long but hey it´s a google email address, cool right? It´s supposed to be better. Well so after today when you want to email me just send the email to my new address: cooper.boice@myldsmail.net

Well that´s pretty much everything. On a side note I feel like I´m finally becoming an effective missionary. I feel like just in the last couple weeks I´ve come to understand a lot better what faith means. 

I love you all! Have an awesome week!  Ok well I´m gonna write a more spiritual letter now to my mission president, and then my comp and I are gonna get out of here and go stick it to Satan and kick missionary butt.

Love,

Elder Boice

Earthquakes in Argentina and Chile

Hi family,
We have had several people ask us if we've heard from Cooper since the earthquakes in Argentina and Chile yesterday, but we haven't received a phone call or email yet.  I'm sure he's fine and he'll have some interesting stories to tell in his next letter. 

I've been receiving hourly reports from other moms who have missionaries serving in the earthquake zones who have been sharing great faith-promoting stories of how the Lord has been carefully watching over the missionaries and the members of the Church down there. 

Please keep Cooper in your prayers, as well as all of those who have been touched by the devastating tremors.  Cooper comes home in exactly 31 days!  Woohoo!

Trina