Pics from the mish

(The drag queen wigs, glad to know he's still a goof ball)

 

(Elder Q and Chen with the Gorhams)

(Sister Davis)

 

Week 14: we are going to turn this area upside down!

Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeey Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeey Heeeeey,

Scripture of the week john 12:26.

 

Ok so i am so stinkin excited to write this email to tell all you guys what elder zilles will be doing this coming transfer. Lets just keep in mind that this is only my third transfer in the mission! We got transfer calls on saturday night, and i didnt sleep a wink that night, i was very tired yesterday at church, and then you add fasting and no sleep together, yeah it was not a goood combination. But anyway, enough beating around the bush. Your son Elder Zilles will be TRAINING. Yes training a new missionary fresh out of the MTC. Do you now see why i am slightly freaking out and wicked nervous? I am still so new in the mission and i am being trusted with training a new missionary. Its absolutely crazy crazy. Wow im getting the worries just sitting here talking about it. But dont get me wrong i am sooooo excited for this opportunity. But please everyone be praying extra hard for me and my new trainie this week and probably most likely for the next six weeks as we figure out how we are going to run things here in lyndon. Its a huge change. Elder Chen has been here in Lyndon for 9 months, that is a wicked long time to be in one area.  Its going to be so fun.

Yesterday i bore my testimony and felt very strong that i just needed to be bold and tell the ward that we are going to turn this area upside down.

 So yeah i will be training a new missionary. Tomorrow at 645 am we are heading to transfer meeting in manchester, the gregorys are driving us down so that will be super fun, ill have a quick trainers meeting with president, then i will find out who i am training and then we will head back to do the wonderful work in lyndon. So please once again pray for me and my new missionary. Our bishop made me feel really good about it. Everyone else in the ward was like how can you train you are a greenie your self. And bishop tucker said "i often have to remind myself that Elder Zilles is so young in the mission, because he does work like he is a seasoned missionary." and last week he saw president wilkey and he told him that "the best missionaries in the mission are serving in his ward" so the bishop likes us, which makes the work so much better. Wow im nervous to be training though. Any advice from anyone would be helpful.

 

 

("At the end of an Elder's mission we do a "Killing pic" this is Elder Chen's")

My doctors appointment is at 4 today, its about an hour drive to get there, as far as how bad my toe is, its gotten alot better, it only hurts usually at the end of the day now, and some days doesnt even hurt, but it swells up by the end of the day, so i figure i still best get it checked out. 

Church was reallly really good yesterday. Testimony meeting was great. And The gorhams came again, also Jinny came for the first time so that was awesome. Tina a former investigator showed up as well and wants to start taking the lessons again. So in a round about way i guess elder chen and i did find our new investigator for the week.

 

 i miss cows a whole ton, its honeslty probably the thing i miss the most, everytime we see a dairy we stop and knock it usually just so i can smell it. Found one registered holstein herd that may let us come do service there so that would just make my day. 

 

So uh whats the weather like back home, seeing how this is the first week of "spring". Has it been nice and warm and sunny? if it has then good for you guys i am very jealous. You can probably guess that it is not sunny or warm here. ive decided that the sun never shines in new england. And it snowed a foot and a half this week. Tuesday our cars were grounded so we had to walk alot. We walked about 12 miles in a blizzard it was great. we played snow ball football on the back roads. while we tracted of course. 

 

Well i think thats about all i have for you guys today, hope i didnt miss anything important. we will talk to you next week. O and dont worry wer have an easter dinner invite to the Jablonskis so that will be very fun. 

Love you guys, keep on keepin on.

Elder Zilles.

(The District-from Left to Right- Elder Walker, Elder Chen. Elder uhl, Elder Q, Sister Reid, and sSster Merril )

Week 13: Red hot testimony

Hey family,

Scripture of the week: Hymn 97.

So i'm starting my email now, but im gonna have to finish it later this afternoon, elder Chen and I are going to a place called franconia notch and going in the sky tram to the top of the mountain and going snow shoeing. A member of our ward runs it, so he is taking us up. It should be super fun and super duper wicked cold.

 

The weeks sure do fly by somedays seem soooo slow, and then before you know it its another Monday. Yesterday something really awesome happened at church. So you remember the couple that we have dinner with every friday night? the gorhams. Well they came to church yesterday. First time in a loooooooooooooooong time it was so cool to see them there i was so happy.

 

I was missing grandmas dinner yesterday, i didnt get any st pat food, but i did where my green flower tie that i bought on sale a few weeks ago. We did at least have diinner with a family, but it was thai food not irish food.

So saturday we had our special meeting with the apostle. It was for the Manchester and Boston missions only. It was in boston, but only missionaries within an hour and a half got to be there in person s we wtched it ia broadcast. But it was still super super awesome. Elder Ballard was the special guest, and he was accompanied by brother christainsen and brother eyring both members of the 70. The spirit in that meeting was sooooooo strong it was great. He also did a training with the bishops and stake presidents later that day. What was really neat is everything we planed to talk to the ward council about got broughtup by the bishop. thats what i call the spirit working together.

.........................................................................................................................................................

Ok I am finally back to a computer. We spent longer with brother Dietline than we thought we would, we got there and he asked if we would help him split some wood, so we dad that for a couple hours. We split a 200 year old maple tree, it was wicked big.

then he took us to franconia notch and we rode that tram to the top of the mountain and snow shoed around and took some wicked pictures, ill send some of them here in a sec.

 

Not too much to report this week, so sorry the email is a bit shorter than usual. Doesnt mean i love you all any less. Im going to try to write back all my hand written letters that i have tonight after dinner with the gregs, but if i dont get to them i am sooo sorry.

This is my last week with elder chen, and we are going to work super hard, we have made a goal to find at least one new investigator this week, which in vermont is a wicked big deal.

The Vermonters have been commenting on how fast i have picked up the vermont words such as wicked and geezum, i dont know if its a good thing or not, but o well i think it is probably here to stay.

I hope you all know that i have a red hot testimony of this Gospel. Jesus is the savior and the Son of god, the gospel was restored through Joseph Smith, and by the power of God he did translate the Book of Mormon, and every last word in that book is true. Someone asked me the other day how i could poissibly believe every word in the book, and i just said well cause every word in that book is the word of god. Thomas Monson is a living prophet of God, and through the atonement we can all be made whole. I never quite understood the atonement till i got out here and have the opportunity to teach about it everyday. always remember that when you are having a bad day say aprayer and ask for help and i can promise you the day will go better.

 

Well i wish i had more time, but alas i do not, so i hope all continues to go well out wast. Remember that someone in vermont loves you. We are very privileged to have the gospel in our lives so never take it for granted.

Love ya bunches.

Elder Quinton J. Zilles

Over and out

Muddy Season

Happy Spring!!!

From Elder Q in Vermont!

 

Week 12: The Church is TRUE

Hello all you wonderful people!!
 

Scripture for the week Alma 48:17 and Joshua 1:9.
 

I always find it very funny that even on dads weeks to email mom still writes more. Ha i love it though, you guys are sooooo great. I am very lucky to have such a great support system back home in the wonderful west. Yes i love the west. I always said i would live away from the west, but the more i see how things work out here, i feel i will always be a western boy. Or Wisconsin of course, but i will never be able to live in the east. It is great here and i love it, but i will never want to raise a family here.

 Brother Gregory passed the sacrament yesterday. I can not express how wonderful i felt inside when he handed me the bread, i almost cried. I gave him my laZee Q hat, so he will have something to always remember me by. Today is his day off, so we will probably end up going up to chill with him for a bit ust because we love him a whole freakin bunch, he may teach us how to skin beavers, so that could be pretty wicked. Sister Gregory was worried that the picture text might freak you guys out, but i assured her that you guys would all love it very much. She says she loves getting them of Elder Gregory. Elder Gregory was out 5 months before he had to come home for surgery. And Sister Gregory told me the other day that she knew i would be coming to this mission, and this area. It was really cool to hear her say that, so i now truly do know that i was called hear for a reason.

Last week you asked if we knock doors alot. The answer to that is YES. We knock doors about 50% of the time and then we work with lots of less actives, and then our few investigators. Dalts new assignment reminds me alot of my mission. We have so much less active work to do. This week i believe we taught 7 less active lessons. We get very few member refferals, so that makes it pretty hard. People in New Engand are very non neighborish. Most of them dont even know who their neighbors are. But the good thing is the ward loves us, so they do feed us alot. Last night we had lamb stew with a less active family. Lets just say i am not a big fan of lamb, but i ate it like it tasted like heaven.

My interview with president was sooooooooooooooooooooo amazing. The spirit was so strong. And he told me some pretty incredible things. It is so cool to me the revelation that he is able to recieve on my behalf.

Sounds like church is going well back in the linrose ward, it has been such a huge change going from my big home ward to my little tiny ward here in vermont, the people are different, but the church is still true, so always remember that.
We did not drop keith. We got there and remembered that is was his birthday, and he was having a realy hard day, so it was not the right time to drop him, but he is still not progressing at all. But we just keep plugging along.

I got an awesome package full of cheese this week, and i loved it sooooo much. There is a creamery like tillamook real close to me here. It is called Cabot Creamery, i havent tried Cabot cheese yet, because i bought some, and then the next day my timmamook came in the mail!

The exchange with elder uhl this last week was good. He has only been out for 3 weeks, so he is still very green. This week i am exchanging with elder walker, he and i are pretty much the same person so im wicked stoked for exchange.

Spring is right around the corner here in vermont. They call it mud season here, because it gets super muddy. Dirt roads here are literally just dirt roads, not gravel, just dirt. Yeah we had some wild times in them the other day.

Well i hope i have answered all the stuff, i love you guys so muchly. Keep me my investigators in your prayers.

The church is true.

Love always elder toner

Week 11: Keep on Keepin On

Hello everybody!!

Scripture for the week D&C 31:5.

ITS A GIRL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!? WOW i can not believe i am actually going to be an uncle, and of a girl. Well she is gonna be one spoiled little girl, because i plan to spoil her a whole tooooooooon.

Sorry todays email is later than usual. we went and did our laundry and then went and played basketball with some of the guys from the ward. It was pretty intensely awesome.

 Yesterday at church Bro G was super super sick, but came to sacrament because he refused to miss taking the sacrament. He is such an amazing guy.

  Our sisters over in littleton are doing pretty well. . The sisters are still teaching the couple that we were teaching from over there. John and marry. it turns out they are not married, which we did not know that. So that is a bit of a road block there. 

 My toe is still attached but it sure is weird. I just barely got off the phone with the church doctor and he made me an appointment to see a foot doctor. the soonest i could get in is march 25, which will be elder chens last pday, so he wasnt to happy about that. But i just told him he goes home two days after that so it will be pday everyday for him. I kept thinking i should just get them to fly uncle dave out here, he could probably get here faster than just using these dang vermont doctors. The closest one is about an hour and a half away, so luckily all medical miles do not count against our miles. It is not an ingrown toe nail, but that is about all i know at this point. i just hope it doesnt fall off before the 25th. 

One of the Elders over in newport, which is the other area in our district is from siuox city iowa, and the other one is Elder walker from honeyville utah, he milked for staci and jarom. Its crazy how the church makes the world seem so small. Elder walker is only in his 3rd transfer so just one more than me, and he is already training, its crazy.

I am not really sure if they have snow days here, if they did it would be one every week so i am not sure. We have gotten snow off and on pretty much for two weeks now, but it hasnt really amounted to anything. I would rather snow than super cold so its ok.

The other day We helped a lady get her van unstuck, and my suit got covered in mud ill send some pics of that. thank goodness for dry cleaning. The native vermonters say spring is right around the corner, but who knows, they are crazy people.

Our investigators are really testing my patience, i have to pray for it everyday, or i no joke might punch someone in the face once in a while. We are most likely dropping keith this week, i hate dropping people. Logan has not been to church in a few weeks, but we did eat dinner at their house last week. Sister Dunoskovic is like my english/australian mom. But my real mission mom is sister Gregory. We might actually be getting somewhere with alan, he asked us to pray before we left the other day, so that was cool. Jinny was sick this week, and the jablonskis were in new york so we didnt see her. She is recently divorced and has two little girls. She has been praying though and told sister Jab that the other day she really felt something. WE had dinner with the Gorhams again on friday, it has been about a month since we saw them, and they still have not come back to church. Will prob go help brother cameron with his maple syrup farm in a few weeks. 

Last week i went on exchange with the new zone leader, elder rogers he is from seattle super chill elder we had a blast. This week I am staying here while elder chen goes to newport, and elder uhl is coming here with me. So it will be my first time being sr companion im stoked, it also means i finally get to drive, i ams stoked for that, i was not made to sit in a passenger seat.

We also have president interviews on thursday so im pretty excited to see what those are like. Well, i think that is about all i have for this week. When is mothers day? ha i have no idea when these hollidays are.

Love you guys. Keep on keeping on!