Announcement, Tutorial, Update •

How to introduce cats & all about our new kitten

Do you remember in my All about Astro post I recommended getting two Siamese cats instead of one?

Guess what!

Meet Cosmo, our four-month-old kitten! We got him for various reasons, but the biggest one was to give Astro a brother, and despite our fears from the beginning, today they are inseparable! In this post I’m going to cover the history of getting this adorable boy, how we successfully introduced him to Astro, and all about his personality. Strap in because this is going to be a long one.

How we got Cosmo

We had always talked about getting a new friend for Astro, but we were never convinced until January this year when we saw a posting for a litter of Siamese kittens. I wasn’t instantly sure, though. I thought the kittens were adorable like everyone else would, but it felt like just another opportunity that we probably wouldn’t take. It was only after running through the reasons that we realised the cirumstances and the timing were too perfect to ignore.

Now, when I tell you we would be going on a trip to New Zealand the following month, you might think that’s the opposite of perfect timing. But the boy we had our eye on wasn’t ready to leave his mom yet, so that 14 days or so away was the perfect amount of time for us and the kitten! Plus, the trip was exciting enough that it made the wait much less excruciating.

We were already going through lots of name ideas. It wasn’t like Astro, where his name suddenly came to us and immediately clicked. We had quite a few on our list that we were going back and forth on:

  • Leo
  • Miles
  • Pluto
  • Dash
  • Cosmo

It’s more that we ended up going with the most “logical” option. Following the space theme with Astro’s name, ending with an O, sounding nice together, we ended up going with COSMO! And I can say it definitely suits him – the only problem is that their names might be too similar and go too well together that we often mix them up…

Many plane flights, mountains, kiwis, gondolas and luges later, we made it back home – and the next day we would pick up our kitten!

The unfortunate thing is that we got very sick by the end of the trip – headaches, severe fever, extreme fatigue. So after we brought him home, the first few days was just us crowded in one room with blankets and cat toys. When you’re sick, everything feels pretty hopeless, so I was put off from almost everything and wasn’t able to fully appreciate Cosmo’s cuteness.

Luckily, Cosmo is growing slowly and is still unquestionably a kitten, so now that we’re well over our sickness, we’ve got a second chance to appreciate it. Astro, on the other hand, seemed to spend one week as a kitten and then blew up into his typical self.

How we introduced our cats

Cosmo was extremely shy at the beginning. Hiding in his igloo all day, running under the bed at the smallest sound, sometimes hissing at us. However, we realised quickly just how playful he was, so all we had to do was wag a toy around and we started building up his confidence. Now he’s so confident that he’s comfortable jumping on a cat who, to him, is about the same size a full grown lion would be to a lion cub.

SPOILER ALERT: Astro and Cosmo are best friends now (and have been since the beginning.)

Today, we’re not really sure whether they were just destined for each other, or if it was thanks to the methods we used that they got so comfortable with each other so quickly. Either way, I’m going to go over the steps we did to introduce them, just in case it would help somebody wanting to introduce two cats.

1. Give the new kitten/cat one room to start off with

In general, this is a good idea. Your kitten will likely be scared of the new place and a large area will overwhelm them even more. Introduction-wise, this is also important so the older cat doesn’t feel like their whole territory is being invaded right away.

2. No eye contact

One thing to know about cats is that they are all about scents. Do not let them see each other. Just allow the cats to sniff each other under the door. You’ll know they’re ready for the next step if they are comfortable going close to each other’s doors. For us, Astro and Cosmo were even sticking their paws under and playfully batting each other.

Astro looking at Cosmo’s paw under the door.

3. Create positive associations

This can be done even if there’s still a door between them. Whenever the cats see or smell each other, give them treats and affection so that they associate each other with positive things.

4. Gradual visual contact

When you think they’re comfortable enough with each other’s scents, it may be time to open the door, but ONLY A CRACK – maybe to the point that they can’t even really see each other. This is just to see how they react when they realise they may finally meet with that cat behind the door.

Watch your cats’ body language: when you open the door, are they excited, scared, threatened, calm, playful, curious? Are they puffing up, hissing? This will tell you how much to open it, and for how long, and whether they really are ready for this step. The first time we cracked the door open, Astro and Cosmo were looking at each other like, “What’s the big deal? I already know this guy. Why are you hiding him from me?” So we were comfortable opening the door even more to the point they could get right up close.

WARNING: While we did this, we had two people on either side of the door holding both cats back. If this isn’t an option for you, just make sure the cats cannot touch or swat each other. It’s normal for them to hiss, but if they start fighting or getting angry, take them away and try again later when they’ve calmed down.

A real image of their first face-to-face!

4. Free roaming (with supervision)

After testing their reactions with the last step, you should know when your cats are ready to “free roam” with each other (as always, every interaction must be supervised).

What we did when our cats were ready was open the door to the kitten’s room. Being there for only a few days, the kitten didn’t strictly consider it his territory, and the older cat was comfortable going in there since it is part of his house. We weren’t ready to give Cosmo the whole house yet, so we let Astro explore his room, sniffing everything he’s scented.

Astro and Cosmo free-roam together for the first time.

It’s normal for things to be a bit different from when they were looking at each other through the door. For us, Astro was relatively relaxed when we first let him into Cosmo’s room, while Cosmo was actually a little overexcited. Once he got too close, Astro hissed. That is the one and only time he has ever done that to Cosmo, and understandably so. The rest of the interaction proceeded as normal. No fights, no swatting, no puffing. Just the cats setting their boundaries and sussing each other out.

But it may take multiple sessions for them to get used to each other’s presence.

5. Let the new cat explore the whole house, go back steps if you need to, and hopefully…

Happy as can be!

All about Cosmo

Astro came from a household where other Siamese cats like him were piled up to the roof. It was like heaven for his breed, so you can imagine his disappointment when he came to a home with no other Siamese. The only other cat he knew was Ruby, an amazing Burmese-Bombay lady who almost lived up to 20 years old! Unfortunately, such an old cat wasn’t a great match for an energetic Siamese kitten.

Astro doing his best to get close to Ruby.

He spent around two years with her before she passed away and was left with no one else… but another year and a half later, he saw his own kind for the first time since he was a kitten – his new brother Cosmo!

Born on the 11th of December 2024, Cosmo is a four-month old kitten. Unlike his brother who is half seal-point, half chocolate point, Cosmo is fully seal-point and is thus already on his way to surpassing Astro’s darkness.

The first time we held Cosmo, I cannot stress just how small he was. He was literally a mouse, being tiny, timid, with these giant eyes and ears. It made me a little bit worried, because as you might recall, Astro was bred to be bulkier to avoid the health problems Siamese usually inherit. However, he has definitely grown since we first got him, and is already catching up to Astro in size, colour and especially confidence! They do physically differ in a few ways, though:

Astro has always had very long legs while Cosmo’s are more stocky.

Cosmo’s ears are still very large and already as big as Astro’s.

And the most noticeable difference may be that Cosmo’s tail is much longer than average, compared to Astro. It’s a good built-in cat toy!

Other than that, it’s easy to get them mixed up at a glance.

Cosmo is a very smart boy. While Astro did occasionally play fetch when he was a kitten (and almost never does today), Cosmo will consistently fetch his ball any time you throw it! He makes a few different sounds to Astro – the most famous one is the growl. He used to make this sound when you got too close to his ball, but now he makes it anytime during crazy hour.

Cosmo hugging his favourite ball.

A cute downside is that Cosmo is… pretty destructive. He’s slowly getting over it but he will take the opportunity to tear up tissues, bite the sides of my iPad cover, pull on my pants strings, etc.

He’s not afraid to literally jump onto Astro and start a wrestle fight either, biting each others’ necks, chasing each other. This doesn’t happen much anymore but it can be shocking when you’re not used to it. Just know that if no one walks away with any wounds, they’re likely being more gentle than they seem. It’s just how cats play. You should still trust your instinct though and you definitely don’t have to encourage this behaviour!

The good news is that they snuggle a lot more than they fight. Despite the responsibility of becoming the leader of his pack, Astro is still a playful, loving boy, and I think it’s safe to say that Cosmo has improved his life in almost every aspect. And I’m glad we were able to give Cosmo a home with another Siamese right from the beginning!

That’s about it from me. I hope you were able to learn something from this post or were at least entertained by the adorable Astro, Cosmo, and a special appearance from Ruby. See you in the next one!

How to introduce cats & all about our new kitten Read More »

Announcement, Update •

My problem with exposure and why I find it hard to post

I have tried at multiple stages in my life to grow a platform online, but have never been able to follow through.

I find it hard to share what I make, whether it be on a YouTube channel or on my very own website. Usually I start off with a little spark of motivation that helps me carry out the first step, but nothing more after that. I enjoy the feeling of being productive, like having a project to chip at in the background, and making it the best it can be. But I hate coming up to the part where it’s time to share it – and so I never really do.

In this post, I’m going to be as honest as I can about why I have been neglecting this site and all my other platforms. I also intend for this to be this website’s key post that contains my goals and intentions for being here.

Why I find it hard to post

Posting anything is usually a big deal for me.

A few days ago, I uploaded a video to my YouTube channel (not the first: there are many other ones hiding under the “privated” option). It was a little animation I made that I hadn’t intended to show to anyone when I first started working on it. As long as I liked it, I was happy, and no one was going to see it anyway, right?

Halfway through the process, I got that spark of motivation to start up my YouTube channel again. Suddenly, I thought that my animation would be the perfect first video to post.

After that, I started obsessing over every little detail a lot more. Now that I’d introduced the idea of showing it to other people, I didn’t like it as much, because the way I saw it, it was no longer “mine.” I wasn’t making it for me anymore, I was making it for my (nonexistent) audience.

Finally, I got to the stage where I was happy with the animation, or more so tired of working on it. I remember saying to myself: “OK, once the colours are finished, there is no way I’m adding shading and a background. That would take way too long.” …you can guess what I added after that?

But then I realised something: at the end of the day, no matter how perfect it looked, it was always going to be just 2 seconds long. So when I came around to editing it, I went for a more humble iMovie style, as I didn’t want to over-hype such a short animation.

My first attempt at posting the video was on a channel that no one even knew I had. I was still nervous. I wasn’t confident in the animation at all and even found it kind of stupid. I was, in effect, purposefully hiding the video from everyone. So what happened was only logical. The video got 0 views from anyone but me. I took it down a day later. But not for that reason.

I couldn’t ignore the feeling that I was already trying to be someone I wasn’t. I’m NOT a minimalist editor. I enjoy the editing process a lot, and ever since I learned how, I’ve always dreamed about going a bit over the top with my videos.

Then I understood that even if a 2 seconds long animation doesn’t “deserve” to be hyped up with high quality edits and a built-in behind-the-scenes look, that’s at least more what I would do. Keep in mind that all I mean by “high quality edits” is that I used Filmora Wondershare instead of iMovie. But that’s probably just me again trying to downplay my work.

The most important change this time around, though, was that I decided to post the video on my main channel, which at least one person knew about.

This was all a step in the right direction. Now that I’d made something I somewhat liked, it didn’t matter to me as much the amount of views it got. So I uploaded it. And guess what? The views part was no different, except for one thing: it had a like and a comment from my brother. For me, who shares about 2% of the stuff I actually make, that was an accomplishment.

So to answer the question, Why do I find it hard to post? The main thing is that I don’t like my work, at least when I make it with other people in mind. But I know that I’m going to have to work on this if I ever want to get something more out of my projects. And that brings me to the question, What do I want out of this?

Why I post

I made this website a few months ago in 2024. It was originally titled Adventure Savy, and apart from the fact that having a personal website is just cool, I made it because I wanted to share bits of my life and document my progress in achieving the goals I had at the time.

Today, things are a slightly different. Instead of exclusively sharing my thoughts, I want to share bits of my projects. It’s less a website for me, and more a website for my work, which is anything from drawing to animating to writing, to anything else I discover along the way.

I’m still asking myself what I really want out of this, if anything. I mainly just post and if people find it, they find it, and if they don’t, they don’t. I don’t put any effort into that actually happening, because I’m scared of that happening.

I’ve always done the bare minimum when it comes to growing a platform online. I post the thing, and I leave. I don’t want to show it to anyone. I don’t want to promote it. I don’t want to bring attention to – or even put that much effort into – something I’m not sure others will like. Otherwise that would mean some kind of commitment, and I’m not a fan of commitments. I prefer for exposure to happen “organically”.

I was going to say that on certain websites, blowing up out of nowhere can happen, and that it has happened to me, but now I’m thinking that actually isn’t true.

I used to have an animation channel, around 2017-2018 when they were getting very popular (I didn’t do it for that reason; I just loved animating). My channel was very steadily on its way upward, and I was confident enough in what I was doing to actually engage with my audience, plan collabs, and further hone my skills. Unfortunately this might have worked a little too well, for my numbers at least. I’d had my channel for about a month at that point, and during that time I had been exposed to a whole new side of the community.

I wasn’t really able to stand my ground back then, so I decided to take a different direction with my channel which wasn’t originally what I had planned, in order to keep up with everyone else’s expectations. 

Eventually I realised it wasn’t the most positive place for me to be in, and I was scared that my success would trap me there. So, I ended up deleting my entire channel.

Like I feared, YouTube can become a commitment at a certain point, but to survive that, you have to enjoy what you do. And if you do enjoy what you do, what reason would you have to quit other than being overwhelmed and out of your comfort zone?

I’m not often proud of what I make, in the sense that I would go around and show it to everyone and not care what they say because I think it’s nice and that’s all that matters – like showing photos of my cat. I usually feel another kind of proud, like I love that one novel I wrote or the fan art I made for it on Procreate, but does that mean I would ever show it to anyone even if my life depended on it? No way. But that prompts the idea that… maybe I should anyway.

Final thoughts

There’s a decision I’m hiding from. Once I figure out my why – why I want people to read what I write, and watch what I make – then I could either take the quiet route, where I continue posting like this and let it reach people organically (which almost definitely won’t happen, at least for a very very long time), or I could get my work out there in the way I know I could if I really wanted to… and I don’t know if I do yet.

I hope I’ll be able to update you soon, but know that if I do decide to do something more with this website, I have a lot of exciting things planned!

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Update •
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Learning how to code

It’s been so long since my last post and that is because I’m getting into coding! I didn’t expect to be having this much fun with it. That, along with learning French, is the main reason I’ve been unable to get to writing a post.

So why am I learning to code again? Right now, I’m learning HTML, moving onto CSS now, and after that, JavaScript, so I can code my own websites. I’m also interested in possibly making apps in the future. This website you’re on right now is made from a WordPress theme, since I knew nothing about those languages when I was making it, so I was very avoidant of solutions to do with coding. I’m still at level 0 pretty much, but if I continue learning then I might even be able to improve this site in the future. 😀

Interestingly, what’s helped me the most with learning code is learning languages, or more so knowing how to learn. Common advice I saw when I first started researching how to code was “learn how to learn.” It’s not that languages and coding languages are the exact same, though there is definitely coding advice that applies to language learning advice and vice versa, but through studying French I’d already discovered my learning style. I know what to learn first, how long to study it for, good memorisation exercises, whether to start with a course or jump right into a project and learn what I need as I go, etc.

When I made my first video game, I was still a noob at both language learning and coding. So even though I’d followed along with a whole 7 hour Unity tutorial, yes I was able to make a game (well, more like Google and coding forums were able to make a game), but today I can barely type one line of C# fluently. It’s luckily the opposite with HTML. I can create at least a simple website without having to look anything up, like how I can talk about my day in French without looking up translations. If you’re interested in hearing some of my methods to achieve this, stay tuned because I might make a post about it in the future! The most amazing feeling is when you come across a problem in your code, after you’ve acquired the building blocks for a language, and you’re able to mix things together and use what you’ve learnt to find the solution yourself, even if it’s far from the most efficient one.

Anyway, as for everything else, it’s been a while since I deliberately went out to take photos with my camera. I can’t really use the excuse that it’s been “winter” either, because “winter” for Perth is basically just summer but 5 degrees lower, with the occasional grey or rainy day. But I’ve still kind of been acting like it’s winter, and so has Astro, my cat, who’s fluffing and fattening up, and also getting darker (fun fact: Siamese “change colours” depending on the temperature!) Unfortunately, he was a bit sick and injured recently. But we took him to the vet and he’s feeling & looking way better now.

Since my brother is getting into writing stories, I offered some time ago to draw pictures to go along with one of his projects, and so now, everytime he finishes a new chapter or scene, I get on to drawing it. This has been really fun, and I’m glad that those two years of learning how to draw has paid off. I just wish I had taken it less seriously. I feel like I could have reached this level in a much shorter amount of time and in a less torturous way. Seeing his stories has also made me wonder whether I should start writing again as well. I’m exploring a concept right now, so we’ll see how that goes!

Overall, I’ve been having a great time recently. This post doesn’t cover everything, I was away for a LONG time. I really enjoyed writing about Astro, so expect to see more posts like that in the future. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you soon! Bye!

Mavionne

Learning how to code Read More »

Review •
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All about Astro

Hello! I’ve been wanting to share some of his infinite cuteness with this website, so this post is going to be all about my cat Astro, AKA Big Boy, and about the Siamese breed in general.

As an introduction: Astro is Siamese, half seal-point, half chocolate point. He’s more oriental-looking than the applehead Siamese, but I heard he was bred to be more bulky, so he doesn’t have the health problems oriental shorthair cats can sometimes get. We got him in December 2021 but he was born that year on the 29th of September, which means he’s currently two years old.

He’s an extremely active boy and his favourite thing to play with is his “chicken”, which is literally just a rubber chicken tied to the cord which fell out from the pants I used to wear. He loves to chase and jump after it… he also likes to chew it so every once in a while we need to replace the chicken with a fresh one like we did yesterday.

Astro is always on high-alert. Though he’s cuddly, he’s often in the mood to play, meaning if I make one tiny move towards him he’ll bolt away. He loves scaring himself. Once I chase him into another room, he finds a hiding spot that I sometimes can’t find and other times can, but I always pretend not to notice him. As soon as he hears me walking out of the room, he comes out of his hiding spot, hits the back of my foot with his paws and then runs out in front of me, like he’s teasing me for not finding him!

Siamese are very smart, one of the smartest cat breeds of all time. Even within the very first days of having him, when he was a little kitten, he’d already learnt how to play fetch with his rubber chicken.

He likes plotting ways to get onto high places, namely the roof. It’s his first task whenever we move house. He can get down by himself but he prefers crying at us to help him down because he knows we’ll eventually get sick of it and force him down by shaking a treats packet. Though, in previous houses, we used to lift up random items like chairs and blocks for him to jump on and be lowered onto the ground. But he’d get treats after that as well.

In the morning at around 8-9 a.m. he meows for me at my door. Once I let him in, he gets really fluffy, not in the intimidating way, and walks around in circles, kind of shrinking into himself like a slinky or caterpillar. During this time he rubs his head on my legs, sometimes licks me, and jumps up on my shoulder while I get everything ready for the day, it’s just the cutest thing ever. Once, I carried him to the lounge room to play, but I had to get a drink of water first. I put him down and started walking to my room to get my water bottle and he ran after me, and tried multiple times to jump at my face like he was saying, “Where are you going? COME BACK NOW!!!” That’s another thing he does: watch out when he locks eyes with you, because this means he’s about to jump at you, which is more terrifying than you can imagine. I’m pretty sure he loves scaring us and hearing our reactions. He hates you looking at him from high places like this:

Overall, I LOVE Siamese cats. As long as you have enough time on your hands, they’re an incredible breed, best temperament, and of course stunning appearance. They need at least twenty minutes of play every day but they reward you with a lot of snuggling and being cute in every situation. They do need to be trained to go to sleep at night and not wake you up early, but this means you need to wear them out during the day. Having a favourite toy helps a lot. I do wish we had got him another Siamese to play with while we still lived near his breeder, so if you’re thinking of getting one, get two! Once you have one cat, it’s barely any different to have another.

That concludes this post! See you soon!

Mavionne

All about Astro Read More »

Announcement •

My first blog post

Hello! This blog post is the last thing I need to do before publishing this website! I’m really happy with the way it looks even though I know it’ll probably change in the future. It’s only taken me only around 10 days to complete, but of course I had already planned out the design beforehand so I knew exactly what I had to do.

See you on the live site!

Mavionne

My first blog post Read More »