Dear everyone out there,

This is gonna be a really dang short email because a lot has happened and yet it feels like nothing happened. And plus today we're having Zone P-Day with the Zone, and basically this Zone is full of some of the greatest missionaries in the mission. Seriously, like every Zone has at least two or three headache missionaries, but President Vidmar said that he's only sending the best missionaries out here because we're a District and not a Stake and he really wants Wangaratta to be a Stake. So I've probably got one of the best Zones in the mission to be honest. So as far as my companionship goes, Elder Wi Neera, Van Wagoner, and I are ZL's, and Faanunu, an Elder from the Tongan program who's been out for 7 months, is also our companion. So we're literally in a quad-panionship. It's really weird and none of us really know why President put us that way. Wi Neera goes home mid-transfer, so maybe that's why Faanunu's here, so that way we can have at least two functioning companionships right now instead of a trio. But all in his inspiration. So this Zone literally takes up about a quarter of the mission, so as the ZL's we do a TON of driving. It's not uncommon to plan a next days activities and find out "Oh what are we doing tomorrow? Well we're driving to Swan Hill for such-and-such, then to Wagga Wagga for such-and-such, and then we'll get back to the flatt at 9:00PM. Perfect." Lots of driving. But the missionaries in this Zone are so amazing! About a third of the Zone has only been out for three months or less, so a lot of young missionaries, and we've also got three missionaries going home in December, so we've got a few old missionaries as well. But everyone is awesome and has great personalities and ACTUALLY HAS THEIR HEADS SCREWED ON RIGHT!!!! IT'S A BEAUTIFUL THING!!!!!

So Elder Van Wagoner has like five bajillion amazing ideas for how he wants this Zone to be run, and I am REALLY glad that he gets to train me as a ZL because he HATES boring Zone Meetings and so do I. Of all the Worsencroft children he's the most serious but he's still a really funny guy. Just more mature than me and Holt. He's basically had this revelation to have a family history booth out in public on certain days, and he's already gotten permission from President Vidmar, the Area Presidency, and for a few things he's required and obtained permission from the First Presidency. If this thing works out as well as we want it to, then he'll probably change the way that we do missionary work in the mission, if not throughout Australia. It's really exciting, and he's just the man.

This week is no exception to the way of driving. We've probably spent a total of 30 hours in the car driving in between areas this week because so many of the areas are literally HOURS away. And plus this week has just been working a ton to make sure that this next Zone Meeting is as inspirational as it can get, because a boring Zone Meeting isn't a meeting worth having. And also, this Zone P-Day we're in the middle of is the first Zone P-Day this Zone has ever had: with President Maxwell he wasn't too keen on the idea of missionaries spending 3 hours to drive just for a P-Day, but with President Vidmar he's just like "Elders, get this Zone more unified. Let's fire up a Zone P-Day!" And plus we've got Zone Meeting tomorrow, so it'll be good.

My companions are amazing, and holy moly it's hot up here! And this one'll be a scorcher at around 98F on average, but we'll survive! Luckily we've got a house, like a legitimate house, and we've got a few AC units throughout it. We're like three hours away from the mission office which makes going to Zone Leader meetings a bit of a drag, but all goods! Basically this Zone is awesome, and I love being here! So that's it from this week, but I loves loves LOVES you all, and as always, God be with you till we meet again.

-Elder Landon Cook

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! (Elder Christenson's 

mom send that stuff to him to wear. 

He wouldn't put it on so I did instead)

 At the mission office swapping companions

 At the mission office swapping companions W/Elder Holt

 At the mission office swapping companions

Because Elder Wheeler was my last ZL

Bush rangers for life

Elder Wade and I 

Getting the HECK OUTTA SEYMOUR
Cleaning the flat

Getting the HECK OUTTA SEYMOUR

Incognito..Leaving Seymour

getting the heck outta SEYMOUR

Last night us four with Elder Knight and Erickson

 ate at a Fijian members place, it was pretty awesome

Six man sleepover with Elder Meziere, 

Faanunu, Wi Neera, Christenson, 

Van Wagoner and me

What Faanunu does during our Zone Leader stuff

The four of us are currently working on a Zone song. 

No other Zone I've been in does stuff like this and I 

love it! And no he's not in his garments that's an 

actual shirt he's wearing

That Aussie street tho

The Bros (Elder Giesbrecht, Howell, and Poulson)

Zone Leader Stuff

SOOOOO This week has been NUTS with stuff and again another action-packed and fast paced week. I woke up pretty sick this morning and my back aches like nothing, but it's probably because we've worked ourselves to death this week. Ugh, it sucks but hey that's the mission! You sneeze and it's already three days later it feels.

Let's start off with Monday. So Monday was just a normal-ish P-Day of cleaning, shopping, and lifting weights in the flatt. Gettin' buff-as or at least trying to. We also took pictures next to the tanks and stuff and that was pretty fun as always.

 Irene Spagnolo ALWAYS feeds us snacks when 

we go to her house. She's such a doll love her to death

Wednesday we did a TON of service. That was practically all we did that day. It was crazy. Moving houses for an inactive member for about four hours, and of course NOTHING was put in boxes so we had to help her out with that. They hay fever was real and kept punching me in the face repeatedly over and over again. I've never suffered from allergies or hay fever, but man here in Seymour it's insane. THEN after that we went to go pull some more weeds for that lady in her 80's named Irene Spagnolo, and she's just a doll. Love her to bits.

service for the Robinson's up on their farm

Thursday we had Zone Meeting and I gave a training which was pretty fun. Elder Halsey, one of the ZL's, finished his mission just a few days before the transfer ended, so we got a new ZL named Elder Lawler who's the man. I also went on exchanges with Elder Chen which was pretty fun, and he's a 26 year old convert to the church who's from China….The man.

Saturday we went to go and do service for the Robinson's up on their farm, and they showed us around their farm a bit. They've got these horses that are pretty cool, and although I'm not a fan of horses (because they're massively powerful and if you spook them and they kick around you're a dead man) these ones are pretty cool. You could pet them, sneak up on them and hug them, no worries.

One cool horse... soft too!

\


So Sunday morning we got a call from President Vidmar right before studies. So I pick it up and he says he's got a special assignment for both of us. He talks to me first and says that he needs me as a Zone Leader up in Wangaratta (which is fetching BUSH-AS) with my other mission brother Elder Van Wagoner. It'll be pretty fun, and I'll have Elder Wi Neera from New Zealand as the other ZL companion. It'll be kinda weird because it'll be three ZL's in a companionship, AND we'll have another missionary in our companionship who's been struggling a bit if you know what I mean, so not two companionships, just one 4-man companionship. They'll be pretty fun. And Vaiouga's going back to the Samoan program with the missionary he trained, and missionaries WON'T be returning to Seymour for a good while which is GREAT!!! Literally it felt like we were kids getting EXACTLY what we wanted for Christmas when transfers were announced!!!

When transfers were announced!

And yes, I am fully aware that Trump is in.  People won't shut the heck up about it.  Honestly it's so annoying, so I'm just gonna work harder on my accent to fake that I'm from Perth like Worsencroft did. I'm sick of the same five repeated words "What's your opinion on Trump?" Absolutely sick of it considering I haven't the slightest idea on what his plans are.

Sickness/Hayfeever does wonders for me...NOT!

There's a lot more to what happened this week but I feel pretty sick as a dog right now and I'm not in  What kinda sucks though is that today we've got to prepare the flatt for hibernation, which means we've gotta clean it up really well and make sure that it's ready for sleep mode for the next “who knows how many months”.  Plus I've got to give myself a haircut and pack my bags and clean the car.  Blegh, I just feel sick.  But that's my life and I'll be up in the bush. I hear that Shepparton is a branch with about 110 active members, half of them Poly and half Aussie. I hear it's more like Melbourne out in the bush, and it's a huge city with about 200,000 people living there. But that's it everyone, I love you alls, take care, and as always God be with you till we meet again ♥
the mood to be on the computer for longer than I need to because I'm just really tired.. Not sure why, but my body's sore and achy and my back really hurts. I took some pain meds but they haven't really helped. No workout P-Day today.

-Elder Landon Cook

Ponderize: Doctrine and Covenants 38:29 (for all of the Aussies pointing fingers at America right now)

Having fun with some tanks 

 

Tracting for fun

Sometimes you gotta stop and smell the roses!

my Instagram picture of the week :)  haha

The many expressions of transfers

       tried making cookies for less-active members 

      but ended up scorching a batch of them. Dang

Got these just right

They're literally called top-notch pidgeons. 

And they are indeed top-notch with such #$W@Gstyle 

Zone Meetings

Zone Meetings

Zone Meetings

So this week has been pretty fast and slow at the same time. The members have suddenly taken a 180 degree turn when it comes to doing missionary work, which is good, but to be honest Elder Vaiouga and I are both really hopeful that we leave. Neither of us wants to spend Christmas here to be honest. I mean, the branch is good and all, but... yeah... It's just weird here! Elder Vaiouga and I doubled into Moe and SMASHED the place (in a positive way of course) and I was really hopeful and optimistic that we could do the same again, especially since we're now much more experienced. I've always known that even if you're in a not progressive area and you're doing your hardest, smartest, and best you're doing the right thing and that you should never ride your hopes on transfers and instead try to work out the situation with the cards you're dealt, but I'm being not good and hoping for transfers to be honest. But things are still so slow. I think this entire transfer we've found like, maybe two investigators? And only one is keen to meet with us again. But only on an every other weekly basis. The other one's just kinda keen to listen but has a mindset of "I believe what I believe, you believe what you believe, and we'll call it goods". So we have one solid investigator. I dunno, it just feels like a drag sometimes. It's a good thing that our District is huge because we get to do a lot of exchanges, and if we're not teaching people then at least we're spicing things up with exchanges on a more-than-regular basis.

Quick selfie with Elder Wilson and I

As far as this week has gone though, it was pretty good. We did a lot of service for some elderly people this week (as we tend to do every week), and we had Zone conference. I went on an exchange with Brother Cheyney (who's a member in the Wantirna South ward and was on a month-long mini mission) and that was pretty fun, and we went to go teach the recent convert who was baptized last year. I also went on exchanges with Elder Wilson, and if you remember him he's the one from the MTC with me.

Me, Elder Vaiouga, Elder Swenson, Elder Summa, 

and Brother Cheyney at the very bottom

To be honest there's not really much to talk about this week. Work is slow and a tad stagnant, but this week we've got a lot of member appointments to help them further their missionary work efforts. It may be a few months before we start to see fruit of that coming up, so I'm sure that I won't see any of the fruits of it and the next missionary after me probably will. Isn't that always the case with missionary work it seems?

So that was my week, and hopefully yours was all a bit better. Hopefully this next week goes good and has a lot of production in it, so we'll just have to prayerfully see what happens as we work our hardest. At least Heavenly Father has stayed the hot weather around here, because on average it's about 50 degrees Fahrenheit when it should be at about 90 Fahrenheit this time of year. And working outside, tracting, and doing service with no progress in those circumstances would send Vaiouga and I absolutely nuts. But I love you all, take care of y'all'selves, and and always, God be with you till we meet again.

-Elder Landon Cook

Ponderize: Psalms 25:10

Doin' some more service with Elder Wilson 

(we did a bit of service for people this week, 

just for an older non-member lady Irene Spanolo 

and a lady named Kim)

Say Cheese Elder Wilson

Using the weed wacker at Sister Shelley's place 
and they call weed wackers here whipper snippers. 
HOW FREAKING HILARIOUS IS THAT!

      All the Zones in the mission made separate

     cloths I Sister Vidmar stitched them together

This one was ours for our area.  I was not the artist :)