A look at 2022 with the critters

For the first time, I did a reflection of the year with Fighter and Penny. Let's just say this is something we're going to do every year from now on.

So every December I usually do this thing where I write a blog post reflecting on the past year. *flexes fingers

This year I changed it up a bit.

Shu Yiing suggested I do a reflection on the year together with the kids, which would be the first time we’ve ever done something like this. And instead of just thinking back on the year and trying to remember what happened (and scrolling through my phone album wtf) Shu Yiing would ask us structured questions to make us really reflect properly. It’s something she does regularly so we just follow her direction hahaha.

So we all got out our notebooks and wrote down our answers to the following questions. I thought it would be nice to put it down here for memory’s sake.

What went well this year (good things that happened this year)?

Fighter:
My birthday
Getting a gaming PC
Londonnnnnn!
My friendship with YS
Scoring 1 single point more on Mandarin test
Chris (his occupational therapist whom he loves)
Gongee’s (what he calls Fatty’s dad) leg getting better
Anwar becoming Prime Minister
Getting my first Pokemon card
Seeing a real earthquake [he didn’t really, we felt the aftershocks from an earthquake in Indonesia]
Finally Hannah [his cousin] told me the worst part of Singapore [I don’t know where this is coming from, maybe he jealous Singapore is so well run or what hahahahaha]

Penny:
My birthday party!
Escape Park
Lots of new friends!
Ballet exam [which I think she aced, but results not out yet]
Tap exam [I think she just likes doing exams wtf]
London
I got better at drawing
Mommy got us presents from Canada
Halloween party

Aud:
London trip
Visiting Angela
Relationship with Fatty
The election
Hiring a videographer: made so much difference in my time and stress levels lol
Influencer outcome grew from last year
Got a pay increase! Colony doing much better post MCO
Came more to terms with aging and my career direction
Maintained my friendships, got closer to Shu Yiing

We all wrote down our London trip! It was probably the highlight of our year and living in our core memories. It made me want to take them on more experiences and travels since now they’re old enough to remember and savor the memories.

What would you do more of?

Fighter misunderstood this question and wrote things he would like to do. All very fanciful hahaha.

Fighter:
Having a waterproof speaker in the shower [??]
Make the toilet “uncloggable” [I guess he clogs the toilet too often hahaahha]
Being 10x richer than Elon Musk [uh ok sure]
Cutting a stack of paper in half with eating knives [???]
Put a whoopee cushion on Madam F’s chair in front of the class [he really doesn’t like his music teacher]
Become a pro gamer
Outsmarting Yunsheng [he means get smarter than him cos YS is the smartest kid he knows]

Penny:
No school
No homework
Going to fun places everyday [she very often asks me what we’re doing the next day cos she looks forward to new activities and outings

Aud:
More social media campaigns
More creative work at Colony
Talk more to kids [these past few months I feel like I’ve been so busy that I haven’t had the time to properly talk to them. Doing this reflection really mirrored that for me]
Plan what other things I want to do in future, career wise
Actually doing something about my career direction than just thinking [lol]
More exposure for kids to new experiences and learnings

What did you dislike doing?

Fighter:
Music class
Math class
Music test
School
Homework

Penny:
Going to school
Getting scolded by Cikgu Lai
Homework

Aud:
Making small talk in Bali
[I need to explain this a bit hahaha. I’m usually very extroverted but I felt soo tired in Bali making small talk with the other girls. They’re all super nice, warm people but I think I was tired cos I was constantly trying to find common ground with them but on the surface level, our lives and even the content we make are very different. We don’t even get invited to the same events so I didn’t have a history with many of them to even fall back on. I was exhausted by the end of the trip hahaha which is very unlike me.]

Designing Jerries
[This year we expanded Jerry like crazy - 6 centers in a year. Jerry’s design is basic and utilitarian and the design is always the same. I never considered myself a creative person, more someone with good taste hahaha, but this reflection made me admit to myself that I was horribly bored and unchallenged this year, work wise.]

What would you change about family/work/school?

Fighter:
Mama to stop nagging [cos Fatty’s mom can get quite naggy at times hahaha]
Butters gets better control with food [cos he’s always stealing the kids’ food LOL]
Penny to stop being ANNOYING
Daddy to stop playing Diablo in my room [Fatty likes to sit in his room while he falls asleep but he’s playing Diablo and the sound keeps Fighter from falling asleep hahahaha O_O]

Penny:
Uncle P gets better manners
Ah Chor not die [Ah Chor is their great grandmother]
People not be scared of Butters

Aud:
Schedule time for social media work [so I have the time and space to be more creative and do more than just what’s required]
Better time management and juggling [yall think I’m very good at this but no I’m struggling like everyone else lol]
Clearer briefing at work
More processes in my work [cos I’m very careless la and frequently forget or leave things out]
To be more intentional with my social media

What do you want to achieve in 2023?

Again Fighter took this question to be asking about his eventual dreams.

Fighter:
Give away money on Youtube (if I become rich) [like Mr Beast I suppose lol]

Penny:
I wanna become a super gymnast
I wanna become super good at drawing
I’m gonna make a bunch of friends
I’m gonna open a bussines [sic] that helps homeless people and dogs

Aud:
Launch xxxxx (tbc wtf)
Level up social media content but don’t know how yet wtf
Get better help for Daddy
See how to further develop the kids’ talents

After that, the kids headed to bed, and I kept at it.

What are you most proud of?

How I raise my kids
I am. I don’t often say it, usually focusing on the kids’s achievements. In fact, I rarely acknowledge my own achievements, preferring to make fun of myself hahaha. But this reflection was about being honest with myself right. I know I have a lot of factors going for me - a secure childhood, financial stability, self awareness - which is down to luck, but I also know that somehow, miraculously, I have done well by these two children. Not just by chance, but by a lot of self reflection, and a shit load of reading and trying. They’re not perfect by any means, but they’re kids I’m super proud to call mine.

How I have maintained my social media influence
Every year I marvel at how I do it hahahaha. When I was in Bali the girls called me OG cos I’ve been doing this since 2004? That’s 18 years ago guys! By some miracle, I’ve managed to evolve my social media presence and grow and stay relevant.

Carsome office
Proud of the level of detail and cuteness of it hahaha - all the car and engine related details carefully and lovingly inserted into their office.

What do you think is your biggest strength?

My ability to talk to people and make good friends at every stage of my life, even when it’s supposed to be harder in adulthood
My ability to handle my kids, intuitively understanding them
My communication skills
For Colony – creativity when designing a space, coming up with big ideas and bringing ideas to life
Influencer – being authentic on social media [that said, I think as I’ve grown older I haven’t been so brutally honest as my early years of blogging when I was still in college. There’s just more to think of now - work, Fatty, the kids - that’s just not all mine to say.]

Biggest challenges you’ve faced?

Building Jerry Damansara Heights
It was a challenge cos I used a new design firm for this. I’ve been so spoiled using the same company before this that they know what to do without much consultation. So me being careless Aud missed out on a lot of things la wtf. I was pretty disappointed with myself.

Bali trip
You already know hahaha.

Time management & juggling between work & kids, always feeling like not enough time and not productive/efficient
*high fives all around*

The decision to adopt
I’ve mentioned it here and there on my Instagram but Fatty and I are open to adopting a child. It wasn’t an easy process considering all the angles but we’re ready! We’ve reached out to whoever we think can help but no luck yet.

What do you think you did best with Tim as a team?

We’re very aligned when it comes to raising children and education

We’re very united now when it comes to outside criticism from parents and in laws

I feel like the above are pretty major sources of conflict in couples and I’m glad we’re aligned, especially being united in the face of outside criticism which wasn’t always the case hahaha.

Summary:

I wish I had thought to do this earlier! But then again this is not something kids can do when they’re very much younger anyway, so I think primary school age is the best time to start an activity like this.

When we were done, I sat back and re-read their sharings and I had to pause for a bit. I found out so many things about my kids that I never thought to ask them before, or just never came up in our conversations.

For example, when Penny revealed that she wanted to “start a business to help homeless people and dogs”. A few years ago I had worried about Penny’s apparent lack of empathy (which I guess was just a developmental stage) but look at her now. I had no idea this was even in her brain, and that she wanted it so much that she wrote it down.

So while she takes time to figure out what kind of business she wants to do, we are restarting our homeless kit initiative. We went grocery shopping yesterday - bottles of water, cup noodles, biscuit packs, soap, toothbrushes and toothpaste. She and Fighter are currently using their savings to fund it but if anyone wants to contribute, please leave a comment or email me at fourfeetnine [at] gmail [dot] com!

They both hate school. So much that school and homework came up multiple times in both their writings. I know they grumble about homework and complain about some teachers, but to see it in black and white really hit home the damage the Chinese school system is inflicting on children’s natural curiosity and love of learning. :(

Penny holds an insecurity when it comes to friends and making friends. Her character is shyer, more tentative than Fighter’s, and she’s more self conscious too. Earlier this year when she first started at primary school, she missed her whole first week because our family was down with Covid. When she got back to school, everyone had settled down and made friends. She was the new kid and it was hard for her to make friends at first. She has lots of friends now, but its affected her enough to not only write this down as a core reflection, but also drove her decision to not move schools just yet, I suspect she wants to extend her time with the friends she so susah payah made.

A small thing that Fighter wrote (and only once) but I picked up, was his “friendship with YS”. He has been friends with YS since they were 5, but this year, they got closer and it’s adorable. They’re similar in a number of ways, and different from other boys in the same ways. YS is super smart so apparently they spend a lot of time discussing math and physics problems wtf hahahaha. When I asked what else they talk about, Fighter said, “We talk about our feelings. And politics.” Hahahahaha.

Their friendship is valuable because while Fighter gets on famously with his other friends, his friendship with YS provides for a different facet of his personality - the more sensitive, introspective side that wants to dissect emotions and contemplate hypothetical situations - and vice versa.

I learned a couple of things about myself too. That I apparently get bored very quick, and there’s a limit to my extroversion lol. I had a hard look at my social media career, but it’s still a work in progress, and probably always be.

I’m so glad I did this with the critters though! I highly recommend doing this with your kids as long as they’re old enough. Year end seems like the most suitable time but honestly, it will work any time of year. Feel free to use the questions we used as a start. Their answers might really surprise you. :)

Happy new year guys!

x Aud.