Patchy mushrooms

I received a shipment of mushroom patches from Fungi Perfecti in October.  After opening the box and reading through the instructions, I set up a calendar so I could keep track of what each patch needed when in order to grow.  The Enokitake patch needed some rest time in the cool basement to recover from travelling while the Shitake patch needed to spend some time in the fridge.  This gave me a bit of breathing room so I could go away for the weekend.

When I returned I had to soak the shitake for 24 hours.  I filled a large red bucket with water that had been boiled and submerged the patch only to have it bounce up out of the water like a bath toy.  In order to hold it under water for a day I had to fill a large plastic container with water and place it on top of the patch and tape it to the sides of the bucket.  This surprisingly worked for 24 hours and filled our apartment with a kind of soupy fermenting smell which faded once the patch was removed and placed in a lasagna pan near a nice warm radiator.  To keep it moist there is a plastic hood with holes that is placed overtop of the patch.  I need to mist it three times a day to maintain the needed moisture.  So far so good- the patch is turning dark brown in places and beginning to blister as it shows in the pamphlet.