February 24

They closed down Traverse-City 2. The zone Leaders will still work there, but Elder Chidester & I both left. They closed down TC2 because there are more missionaries leaving the mission, than there are coming in. There isn't enough missionaries to cover all the areas. :) It's nothing Elder Chidester & I did.

I'm in Jackson right now. (Jackson-2) It has the state prison, it's pretty ghetto here apparently haha

My companion is Elder Aros (are-ose) He's a visa waiter for Australia, & has just got done being trained. He's originally from Guam, but lives in Tennessee.

Elder Chidester & I said goodbye to a few people. The family he's going to miss the most is the Millners. They were less-active when he got here, but since he's been around they made a complete U turn in their lives, & they're a lot happier. Elder Chidester was crying when we left. They're the main reason he was called to Traverse City.

I'm going to miss them too. I'm a little bummed about leaving, but I'm sure jackson's going to be great. We have mice infested in our apartment! :) I prayed that none would crawl on me while I was sleeping, so far so good.

Glad to hear your doing well. I keep you updated with Jackson.

Have a great week!

Love,
Elder Candland

p.s. your going to get another package from me. Some more stuff that I didn't have room to pack. Lars is welcome to that venom shirt, & Shaini's welcome to that sweater. And, whoever wants that bag.


1. Me with a Parrot

2. Millners


3. TC Branch President

February 16

Fri we got to see Elder Nash. We left the apartment around 5:10, & got back at 9:00. It's a long drive.
He taught some cool things. My favorite was how to deal with Investigators getting anti.
Before you leave the first visit;

1. Remind them of the spirit felt. 
2. (there's a couple of scriptures you share about opposition, but I don't have my notes, sorry.) 
3. Have them promise you, that they will let you in when you go back & answer their questions.

A member who is a chiropractor fixed my back Tues, that was nice.

Another member feed us gyros. He made them with marinated venison. They were good, but not as good as Dad's ;)

Sat we had a blizzard. It was -15° & howling, we could barely see more than 50 ft ahead of us sometimes. Pretty scary. That day we had permission to use the car, since the roads were too dangerous to walk on.

Church was canceled, due to the  weather, but it calmed down Sunday, it wasn't bad enough that we couldn't go anywhere.

So, that's my week. Today is going to be pretty average. We did go with some members to a comic book store earlier, that was fun.

I cant believe how close it's getting, I can almost start counting down the days. Hopefully they keep me here in T.C. I don't want to have to pack my stuff again.

Bye! Have a good week!

Love,
Elder Candland

p.s. A member here, his name is Mack Stirling, served his mission in Norway. Turns out he was companions with Jan Sjavik! (I think I spelled that right) He wants me to see if I could get his contact info. Also, he's told us that he knows nothing about computers, so address or phone would work best.


1. Sutton's bay

February 9

Elder Chidester has been letting me lead planning, & driving us places this past week. It helps me realize how little I know about the area. There's so much area to cover.

(fyi Chidester is pronounced Chid-est-er)

We have a 1/2 mission training Fri, Elder Nash is coming for reals this time. I'm looking forward to it.

Our district leader is Elder Hess, he's a distant, distant relative of Elder Hess. He's cool. He takes the work seriously, but there's not a dull moment with him.
I got to see bro Baker again. He's doing good still.

There's a Mexican family here in the ward. They don't speak much English, but just enough to have a conversation with them. They took us to their favorite Mexican restaurant, good stuff.

Nothing much else exciting. We did walk like 5 miles Saturday. I don't know if I mentioned, but we're doing this mission wide car fast every Saturday. We're supposed to work with the members more, but unfortunately most members do so much running around during the week, that they're done by the weekend. We do get a few really great members though that do take us around.

Week's been kinda boring, we didn't get to see as many people as we liked, but this next weeks looking good. Hopefully things move forward.

Have a good one!

From your Michiganary,
Elder Candland

(sorry, no pics)

February 2

Yes, it's still cold. It ranges anywhere from 38° to -1°

Monday evening we had dinner with a family with their newly wed son & his wife. They talked about their wedding. The parents kinda rolled their eyes when it was brought up, because it was Star Wars themed, & their wedding cake was a Deathstar.
I just thought I'd start with that.

Anyway, my week was good. I'm getting to know my way around better.

During our district meeting I was told that our way of finding & teaching is wrong. We need to teach shorter, more simpler lessons, & we need to not be so persistent or I guess pushy on the doorstep. Also we should be happy. Apparently our mission is one of the most depressed ones.
We also were encouraged to help members work with Facebook as a way to share the gospel. i.e. posting short uplifting thoughts, or looking through their list of friends to find someone who might be interested.

Tues I spent in Cadillac. I had a trade off there & got to see some familiar faces. I'm going there again tonight.

Elder Davis's trainee was with the zone leader on a trade off. I got to talk to him for a bit. He says Elder Davis is a great guy, & tells him lots of stories of when we served in Saginaw.

We put 2 new investigators on baptismal date! The work's really moving forward here!

Elder Elmer, one of the zone leaders, is such a funny guy. He really soft spoken, but he's also really outgoing & fun. He called us one night & was impersonating a little girl. Elder Chidester thought it was creepy, but I got a kick out of it.

Anyway, it's good to hear from all of you. Have a good week!

Love,
Elder Candland

1. T.C. bay

January 26

This is going to be very quick.

We moved a lot of wood one night. We could see the sun set as we were working, hauling split wood into a members storage. It was cold on top of that. It's fun when you work hard though.

After our district meeting in Cadillac, we saw some people pulled off to the side of the road. We pulled over and asked if they needed help. They told us they were on their way to Traverse City, and that they were just waiting for their engine to cool down, before they kept moving. We were able to set up an appointment, and we visited them, and taught them the restoration. The family liked it and told us they would read the book of Mormon & pray about it.

We're having a lot of success out here. We have another person we're going to meet soon that asked us for a book of Mormon and told us he would read it.

Anyway, I should get going.

Love you!

Elder Candland

January 20

Traverse City is HUGE! My new companion, Elder Chidester, has been here since halloween, and he still gets lost. We rely heavily on his GPS. I don't know how things are going to go when he leaves.

There are countless places to shop here. It was a bit overwhelming to decide where to go p-day. We were gonna go to the mall, but we were both shopped out before we got there.

So, about my new companion:
He's 20, & he's from Idaho. When he speaks, it's usually loud, not quite as loud as Mc.Dowell, but he's definitely not soft spoken. He's also really into lifting, & wrestling. In fact I could definitely see him being a coach. Also, he loves Batman.

The Traverse City Branch belongs to a district, not a stake. I had no Idea that there were even districts until I came here. We have enough members that we could easily become a ward.

It seems like most of the members here are rich geniuses. I've had dinner with a couple of doctors, both are good at what they do, & read like no other. 

Friday we saw a kid walking home from school making owl noises, he stopped and talked to us about how his uncle can make all sorts of animal sounds. Then later that evening we had 2 cats fallow us around in the cold. One of them leaped into one of the residents house.

I've decided I'm not going to have pets. At least not until I'm an empty nester.

Sunday, all 4 of us Elders spoke in sacrament meeting.
I bore my testimony on how our experience in life is going to be very different from the next person. However if we live the gospel, we are promised peace & joy, in this life, & the next.

I'm enjoying my time out here. I hop you're enjoying yourselves.

TTYL!

Love,
Elder Candland


[new address]
5067 village lane court, Apt. A
Traverse City, MI 49685

1. 45° from equator

January 12

Don't have much time. This may be pretty short.

Getting Transferred  to Traverse City.

These part few days I was able to say goodbye to a lot of the owosso family's. I didn't realize my impact here until I left. It was sad to leave. If I was a sister missionary I probably would've been balling.

Traverse city is really nice, really clean, & well kept. Rumor is we have one of the nicest apartments. It's in a members basement. It's like a vertical duplex.

I don't have my journal or planner so I can't remember anything exciting that happened this past week.

I did leave the area with a new investigator. We had just shared the restoration with her. There's potential.

Hope you have a great week, I'll be back with more of traverse City.

Love,
Elder Candland

1. The Oberlins

2. The Rileys

3. Elder Wiscombe & I dressed up one night. Us two had some good times