50 Cubits High

Manda studies religion all day, every day.  That makes Manda a little crazy sometimes.  The Friendly Mushroom loves holidays.  There are Jewish holidays.  Manda sometimes makes her apartment celebrate Jewish holidays.  This post is about one of those times.

The Jewish celebration of Purim commemorates the story of Esther.  It's akin to our celebration of Halloween, but Biblical.  So, you dress up, drink until you can't tell the difference between the heroes and villains in the Esther play, and generally have a good time.

We here in The Friendly Mushroom adapted the holiday and it was fun, if I do say so myself.  Panda and I went to the store and bought Sprite and sherbet and chips.  We made a sort of punch and ate the chips while watching the Liken the Scriptures version of Esther. The film was very much in keeping with the spirit of the holiday and we all sang along to the songs.  Micah and Kari came over and watched with us.  It was great!

That's one thing I love about being this age.  You grow up with your parents and they have customs that you love.  But then you go to college and live with different people who have customs and are introduced to different holidays and traditions from around the world and you get to embrace those.  Forming your own traditions is fun and really helps embrace the amazing diversities this world has to offer.  

Finally, my favorite video about Purim.  It's the best and I watch it every year.

I am the morning and the evening star, if I say day is night, thus it shall be written.
-Manda

We are the Tinies. The mighty, mighty Tinies.

Everywhere we go, people wanna know, what we are, so we tell them: WE ARE THE UNICORNBATMANSECRETUNNELMUSHROOMAVENGERS OF THE WORLD (we'll keep on dancing 'till the end).

Left to right: Manda, Shli, Panda, Mellie, Bon-Bon

I made sure to get a nice group photo of us... Okay, so it's not a photo, but it could be. We could also be unicorn goddesses in disguise, but that is TOP SECRET. Did I mention I'm having this slight obsession with the Percy Jackson series right now? It should be made known that I could become an involuntary fish-vegetable at any given moment. But please! Don't let that scare you away. There is so much to explain with so little time. If you turn chicken, we'll understand, but we might eat you. Also, I may or may not have started writing this post after midnight. o______o *whale*

The year flies by so quickly and when one realizes how little informed they are about our not-so-secret-society, it can leave one feeling dreadfully normal. BUT WAIT! Panda has swooped down to save the day and rescue the unsuspecting readers... or has she? Why is Panda speaking in third person? That is the right question. A question to ponder over the eternities... though not right now! I have much to explain.
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Please excuse my sudden... outbursts. They can be rather unpredictable and strangely uncontrollable. The story I have to tell this fine night is about a book. Not a very large book, but a book all the same. It is a most particular book; unfinished yet flowing with information so deep that the minds of mere mortals would explode if....err, I mean... forget that part. Hehe...heh, where was I? Oh yes, this book is a small book. Many of its pages lie waiting to be filled with the glorious memories and stories that we uphold here in our little apartment. We love this little quote book, and it loves us. One day it may become one of the greatest books the world has ever known. But until then, you should know that there is much to be told by our little book. It's small pages flow with the wisdom of our not-so-quiet-and-frankly-sporadic home. Only time will tell what will become of it. Only time will tell how many times we shall quote our quoted quotes in the quote book. And that, my friends (if you dare let me call you that), is another story.

...
A story filled with magical beasts, dragons, unicorns, creatures of earth, water, sky, and fire. Gods and Heroes and Powerful beings. Mountains and planets and *gets smacked in the head by someone nearby* -- OK, okay! Sheesh. THE END.
(P.s. pandas are amazing. And so are llamas. :D

-With sincerest regards the WHALAPANDAUNICORN GODDESS (aka Panda). ;)

Roses Are Red...

We here in The Friendly Mushroom take holidays very seriously.  Let's face it, an excuse to dress up, take pictures, and ditch our homework is always welcome.  Really, we hardly need an excuse to do all of that suff anyway!

On Valentine's Day, we woke up to our table covered in hearts from our new roommate Julie, who just happens to be a cookie decorator.  She decorated the cookies herself!  We just love her! And not just because she bakes us things all the time.  She's super amazing too.  Since our beloved Shli had to leave us, we consider ourselves lucky to find such a wonderful other roommate.


Anyway...

As the holiday of St. Valentine carries the idea of dating with it, some of our roommates were not going to be found in the apartment that night.  So, what do you do when two of your roommates have dates for Valentine's and another one has assignments due the next day?  Have a single roommate awesome party, of course!  Manda Squared decided that the best way to celebrate their perpetual singlehood would be to spend it in Barnes & Noble.  Armed with our Starbucks hot chocolate, we walked into the bookstore and lost ourselves in a world of YA Fiction and journals and cookbooks. Well, Manda looked at cookbooks while Panda looked at books on sale, because the one really likes cooking and the other...not so much.  Haha.

After a good hour at the bookstore, we came home, made a blanket fort, and watched Leap Year.  Because nothing says Valentine's Day like Matthew Goode and Irish accents!  After the movie, Panda and I cleaned the front rooms, which actually turned out to be way more fun than we thought it would.  Who knew scrubbing pots and folding blankets could be that much fun?

And that's what two of the roommates did to commemorate the day of love.  We celebrated our love of hot chocolate, books, movies, and cleaning.  Best Valentine's Day yet?  Heck yes, baby!

Peace Out,
Manda

THE Mission Call of ALL Mission Calls

Wednesday, January 23 - An average day in the lives of many. Classes throughout the morning, homework for the in between time, and indexing later that night. Oh yes, and it was the day Bro Winters from the stake told Shli her mission call should arrive.
Even though there was no real hope of the mail coming so early, Shli's hourly mail check began at noon. Around 5, when all decent mail should clearly have been delivered, the mailbox remained empty. Manda graciously tried to comfort and distract Shli. Together, they whipped their hair back and forth to release anxious energy. This was followed by listening to the legendary One Direction that instantly calms the soul.
After another phone call to the post office and a final trip to the mail box, the roommates accepted  that the call had not come. The Monday holiday must have delayed the mail, and everyone believed the call would come the next day.
Thursday's mail did not include a mission call. With a heavy heart, Shli accepted the fact that the call was not to come until next Wednesday. She put on a brave face, told herself she could wait patiently, and tried to keep her hands busy so she wouldn't pull her hair out.
Friday, January 25 - A day of miracles. Without much hope of the call coming, Shli headed outside to check the mail. Moments later, there was a strange sound on the door #10. It sounded like a gasping seal (this was later diagnosed as human pre-hyperventilation) unable to enter the apartment due to spastic laughter, shaking excited hands, and momentary memory loss on how to properly turn the door knob. Finally, Shli burst through the door screaming and waving a large white envelope in her arms. Luckily, Panda was nearby to restore order to the scene. As Shli hysterically collapsed onto the bean bag, Panda was there to confiscate the envelope until the other roommates were there to watch the grand opening.
After a long day of calling friends, messaging family, nervously checking the time every thirty seconds, and sporadic screams of  anticipation, Shli's moment arrived.  When Shli returned from picking up some Idaho buddies, the apartment was stuffed with friends from the ward. Shli got her Dad on the line, and then it was time. She slowly began to tear the envelope open, inch by inch. With only 2 inches left.....Ryan burst through the door! Glad he could make it...and way to break the building suspense. Shli ripped off the last pit of paper, pulled out the papers, flipped it over, and read,
"Dear Sister Munger: You are hereby called to serve as a missionary of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. You are assigned to labor in the Oregon Portland Mission. You should report to the Provo Missionary Training Center on Wednesday, March 13. 2013. You will prepare to preach the gospel in the English language."
Cheers, hugs, congratulations, more hugs, smiles, excitement, and even more hugs followed. The friends filed out, but the smiles and excitement remained. Panda treated everyone to a delectable Coldstone trip, and they all lived happily ever after....until cleaning checks  began later that night...but that's a different story.

Utopia & Other Realities

“The many great gardens of the world, of literature and poetry, of painting and music, of religion and architecture, all make the point as clear as possible: The soul cannot thrive in the absence of a garden. If you don't want paradise, you are not human; and if you are not human, you don't have a soul.”
― Thomas More, Utopia

After various wild adventures from running a 5K with siblings to watching the fireworks under the Space Needle on New Years to...well, you get the idea...the five of us are once again safely under the protective watch of our beloved Hydra.

And man, has it been a crazy three weeks back! Let me tell you, talking every night about whatever is on our minds, ward activities, secret sharing, and generally having a social life means that schoolwork is one of those things you have to fit around the craziness. Not really, but sometimes it feels like it.

One pervading theme for the last few months has been the idea of Our Mountain. It all began last year and its been added upon since then. Our mountain is an ideal. We all get along so well (I mean, if the worst fight you've ever had is a passive-aggressive plea for your roommate to do their dishes, you've got it good) that we've perpetuated it in our minds through the construct of the mountain.

Our mountain is a mountain (I know it's a shocker) with a mansion and a library and a petting zoo and greenhouses and caves and, and, and...basically it's a place where I can write my verse-by-verse commentary on the Standard Works, Mellie can cultivate her greenhouses, Bon Bon can read books all day long and tend our library and learn languages, Panda can work on websites and sing all day long (much to our delight), and our dear Shli can have her own workout room. Can anyone say running...or Insanity?

Not only that, it's our fantasy land where we have pet snow leopards (domesticated of course), and octopi to make ink for clothing tags (that's another blog post...) and a petting zoo (complete with unicorns and hedgehogs...and pandas), and a treehouse. It's an anarchy, because really that's the only government any of us would care to sustain, where we're all able to pursue our passions. We'll have the free time that we crave and we'll be able to go on random crazy adventures. It's our own personal Utopia.

If you ask any of the five of us if we really think our kingdom of single-hood is going to happen, the immediate answer will be, "Of course!" This is because our mountain is the place where everything works right and we have the endless time to do and become everything we want to be. It's a place where school and occupation pressures no longer exist. We'll each have time to develop our talents and pursue our interests to their fullest. It's a fantasy that keeps us sane when the homework and other responsibilities pile around us to the point of no return.

Don't despair though! The Mountain is a concept that will not be denied. In one form or another, the concept will be manifest in each if our lives.

Merry Christmas-in a fort!!

We kicked off our designated Christmas eve night as an apartment with creating costumes as Lord of The Rings characters.  The reason?  We had tickets to the 12:05 showing of The Hobbit!
After the wonderful show (and meeting Gandalf) we came back and got ready for bed, still raving about our love of the movie.  Our blankets were all moved into the living room as well as all our pillows and all was spread over the floor.  The five of us slept in our Christmas fort made out of multi-colored sheets and a shower curtain and dollar-store ribbon hung crisscross across the ceiling.  And a wonderful night it was.  When we awoke in the late morning, waiting for us were the gifts we had all wrapped frantically the night (morning?) before.  And the apple cider was poured and presents opened and joy filled the house!  Though finals were still on our minds, our Bon-Bon dressed up as Batman to complete the morning, inspired by her brand new knee-high socks that each had their own cape.
After our celebration we parted ways until the new year, but are looking forward to the adventures that await our next semester of college together.

Merry Christmas to All!

-Mellie

The Boy Contract

We, as roommates, like each other a lot and thus like to spend crazy amounts of time together.  Therefore, there have been several conversations in which we have expressed something like, "Guys, I'm so glad we're all single.  That means we can hang out more."  As this is the pervading sentiment in the apartment it has produced a list for when one of us inevitably begins dating someone, poor girl.

I. If a girl holds hands with a boy, she owes each of the girls in the apartment their own bag of M&M's. 

II. If a girl kisses a boy, she owes each girl in the apartment ice cream (including the expensive lactose free stuff) in payment for her transgression.

III. If a girl makes out with a boy, she owes each girl in the apartment her own whole pizza (including gluten free).  

IV. If a girl gets engaged while living in our apartment, she owes the apartment a group trip to Salt Lake, preferably overnight. 

V. If a girl kisses a boy 200 times, she owes the apartment a reunion trip/epic sleepover with ice cream and pizza and a blanket fort with Christmas lights and Nutella.  Because that's not random....

I am the morning and the evening star.  If I say day is night, thus it shall be written!

- Manda