To all those elementary school art teachers who told me I’d “never make it in life” if I kept “talking about eating paint”: look at me now, doubters! The one you called a “disruption” in 3rd grade is now disrupting the cereal journalism world. Seriously, does the world need more Vincent van Play-Dohs, or someone who can see a placid bowl of milk as a blank canvas?

(I owe it to all those tempting saucers of Elmer’s for priming my mind to love creamy dairy.)

If there’s anyone who would have nurtured my longtime love of interpretive cereal art, it would’ve been Bob Ross. Hailing from the same class of divine earthly kindness shepherds as Mr. Rogers, the late Robert Norman “Bob” Ross has seen his legacy of nonjudgemental encouragement and zen-like countenance revived in recent years, as an increasingly troubling world calls for innocent escapism into the ever-accepting landscapes of Bob’s paintings. Heck, you can still watch The Joy of Painting marathons streamed on Twitch each weekend—certainly a better weekend plan than downing a couple glasses of Pantone Punch*.

*Goes without saying, but please do not ever drink paint—just swirl some food coloring into your endmilk instead.

The latest commercial collab to bring Bob’s philosophy to physical media is The Joy of Cereal, an FYE exclusive spotted by fan @DaleMethod on Twitter that (surprise, surprise) is another toasted oat and marshmallow cereal that will probably taste the same as FYE’s other marked-up marbit fare. The interesting development here is the cereal’s inclusion of seven diverse marshmallow shapes, each bearing a clear or dubious connection to a hallmark feature or painted embellishment from Bob’s show. The Joy of Cereal’s marshie menagerie features, from left to right above:

– Happy Little Trees (which look more like ice cream cones or maybe disco carrots)
– Happy Little Accidents (a clever way to repurpose some wholesale Yoda marshmallows, I’d wager)
– Almighty Mountains (presumably the deified cousins of America’s Purple Mountains Majesties)
– Guiding Stars (each hopefully containing a piece of Bob’s eternal soul to lead and heal us)
– Rainbow Hearts (based off historic x-rays of Bob’s own?)
– Charming Little Cabins (I’ll lay down a cool $20 that says we’ll never, ever see another cabin-shaped marshmallow before cereal goes extinct)
– Lovely Little Bushes (an inclusive choice, for the vegan cereal lover)

Some of these shapes are serendipitously beautiful, while others feel a little shoehorned in, especially considering the shocking absence of Happy Little Cloud marshmallows—which seems like it would be a geometric and economic no-brainer. Regardless, if you want to collect a box of The Joy of Cereal, and perhaps pick out all the marbits to melt them into interpretive art, it should be hitting an FYE near you soon.

I hope next time they put a culturally beloved virtuoso on a cereal, it’s a box of “Yo-Yo Ma’s Mellow Cellos” (featuring freeze-dried frozen yogurt pieces, of course).

Our thanks again to @DaleMethod for the photo. If you have a happy little find of your own to share, feel free to visit our Submissions page.