Smart Parenting Cover: Kryz Uy and Slater Young
It’s a busy Sunday morning at the Skypod with Kryz Uy and Slater Young squeezing in a shoot before they spend their rest day with their family. While others might still be sleeping in, the young couple are already ready for their first cover shoot with Smart Parenting. Their sons, Scott, 3 years old, and Sevi, who was a few months shy of one year old at the time of the shoot, hadn’t woken up yet but mommy and daddy are already busy working.
“He's a little me that looks like Slater,” Kryz says of their eldest, Scott. They say he has mommy’s habits, including being clingy, and he’s quite malambing to Kryz. Slater says his wife is the patient one between the two of them, often facing their kids’ temper tantrums and processing their emotions with them whereas he tends to get upset or walk out when they do. “She has a lot of patience talaga. She’s the one who reins me back in na parang ‘relax lang’” Slater says.
Sevi, on the other hand, has yet to reveal his personality since he’s still young but they’re already guessing that he might be the opposite combination: a bit more like daddy but looks more like mommy. “More chill kami with Sevi than Scott,” Slater says.
It doesn’t take much for Kryz and Slater to talk about their family life and even their thoughts on relationship challenges, because that’s what they do as podcasters and hosts of the Skypodcast. And when it comes to talking about each other, they’re even more generous. Slater describes Kryz as eloquent and caring, revealing that she reads a bedtime story to their sons every night. He credits this routine as the reason why their eldest son is also expressive, himself.
Slater says he’s often busy working and Kryz feels his example is a positive influence on Scott. “I also see that because he sees you working all the time and accomplishing all of these things, he really looks up to you which is really good,” she says. Kryz recalls that Scott brought Slater his broken dump truck toy, which he fixed, and his son said ‘Dad can fix it because he's an engineer.’ She adds, “Proud na proud siya sa ‘yo which is something that I also like to see, that he's not looking at his dad bumming around and not doing anything.”
Slater is also like most dads, the go-to parent for some good old rough-housing, which Kryz describes as being “the fun parent.”
'Everyday we're still kinda struggling to find a balance. We don't know what we're doing until now. So we're in the fake-it-till-you-make-it stage of parenting,' —Kryz Uy
“Everyday we're still kinda struggling to find a balance,” Kryz says about their parenting stage. “We don't know what we're doing until now. So we're in the fake-it-till-you-make-it stage of parenting,” Kryz says while poking fun at themselves.
“We try our best lang,” Slater follows up her explanation. “Pero I think it's common naman na confused talaga palagi yung parents.”
Kindness is at the core
As one of Smart Parenting’s 20th anniversary celebration awardees, the Skyfam has inspired its followers and young families to exercise kindness–to others, and most importantly, to themselves, and social media has been a witness.
“I think it's at the core of everything,” Kryz says. She explains that because they often remind Scott to speak kindly, he’s grown more used to it. “A lot of people see it on the vlogs [and ask] na, ‘How come Scottie's always asking you guys for permission?’
She adds, “It's because that's how we taught him to be kinder, express himself kinder.” Even when he’s talking about things he doesn’t want to do, Kryz and Slater remind their son to express himself kindly.
'At the end of the day, everybody has their own struggles. It's hard to be a parent. But you just have to learn to love yourself and know that it's okay.' —Slater Young
Even with themselves, a young pair of parents who holds influence in Philippine social media, Kryz and Slater believe parents should be showing kindness to themselves, too. Slater hopes to remind young parents like himself not to let the parental guilt get to you–the guilt for going to work, the guilt if your child has lots of big emotions, or that guilt that you’re not doing enough. Because, according to Slater, “You’re a good parent.”
“At the end of the day, everybody has their own struggles. It's hard to be a parent. But you just have to learn to love yourself and know that it's okay.”
Kryz realizes that that is Slater’s constant reminder for her. “He's the one who's constantly telling me that to ‘Relax, chill out. You're doing a good job.’” She adds, “Don't beat yourself up on things that we can't control or we don't know the results of,” whether that’s ‘Did I give my child too much chocolate or is my child sleeping too much? Not enough?’
“So as long as we give a little bit more grace to our children and ourselves, we're doing a good job,” says Kryz.
Allow kids to express themselves
Kryz and Slater say their parenting strategy is to allow their kids to express themselves and experience different things. To Slater, ‘Smart Parenting’ means “to be a little bit more open.
To let the kid explore the boundaries of what it really takes.” Even if that means running around and falling constantly, it’s okay. “We make light of a situation wherein he makes a mistake. It's okay to make mistakes.”
Slater says he allows his kids to take the lead on how they want to explore and learn, “and sasakyan lang namin. We want Scottie to go towards what he really wants to do,” says Slater.
“I think when it comes to parenting, today, there are so many books and handbooks telling you to do A, B, and C. And we kind of suffocate our kids a little bit without realizing it.Because we impose all of these rules and structures in their lives,” says Kryz.
“But what Slater and I want to do is kind of to let him experience and live life on his own terms.”
She adds, “So just a little bit more free, just a little bit more open to expressing himself in any way that he wants. If he wants to run around barefoot and he's going to get ants biting him on his feet, it's okay. We'll let him experience that so that he'll know on his own.”
From harping on kindness, to letting the kids take the lead in learning, to ditching parental guilt, Kryz and Slater are the quintessential millennial parents. And we’re here for what they’re bringing into the conversation.
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Sittings Editor: Ronna Capili Bonifacio
Video Producer: Cherrie Julian
Art Direction by Stephanie Ocampo
Photographer: Jeffrey Roger Kho of Rock Paper Scissors Photography
HMUA: Raisa Jan Bercede-Lumapas
Stylist: Agustin Pedrano III for StylelikeAi by Airene
Videographers: John Alvin Merin
Editor and Post-Production by: Rolando Pingco, Jr.
Social Media: Zen Arganda
Publisher: Iza Santos-Cuyos
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