2025 was an amazing year for me, and I hope it was great for you too! I thought it would be cool to compile my 2025 highlights in a more personal blog post.

This, just like many parts of this website, was inspired by Tania Rascia.

Offline

I finally moved to Belo Horizonte, the state capital. That’s something I was planning for so long. I’m in love with the neighborhood I live in, and with having trees outside my office window, and living next to so many good friends…

I recently adopted two cats, please say hello to 🐈‍⬛ Billy & 🐈 Salsicha!

Billy is a brat. He loves to play with whatever you give him, to run around the house, and to wake me up at 6AM. Salsicha is very shy and a bit possessive. He hides all the time but will get out as soon as he sees Billy getting patted, but don’t you dare pet him without him asking, tho.

They are very good brothers and love to play with each other all the time. Ever since I moved out, I wanted to adopt a cat, but I was convinced that getting two would be ideal… I was skeptical at first, but now I’m sure it was the best choice I could make!

I also started (and finished) taking sewing and tailoring classes for beginners. It was great having something in my routine that involved getting out of the house and not using a computer. I met some amazing people and got to learn a new skill.

I’m still unsure if I’ll continue with more advanced classes now or do something completely different…

Coding

Here’s my contribution history from 2025 on GitHub:

By the way, the latest design of this very website was updated this year! Here’s the before and after:

Previous design (2022 - Jun 2025)

Current design (Dec 2025)

Last year I decided to learn Rust because I thought that mainly coding JS/TS only was limiting me when I wanted to code anything that wasn’t a web app. In 2025, I must have coded in Rust at least every week. Good job, me!

Making games

This year, I started making a game called Youma: Bewitching Demons. This will be an ARPG (or an Exile-like, as I prefer to call it) setup not too far in the future and will be focused on creating your own skills.

I’ve been working on this project since July alongside Sky, who is currently mainly wearing the game designer hat. Recently, our friend Rod has also joined the team as a visual artist. And as for me, I’m doing a bit of everything: coding, UI design, game design, 3D modeling, animating…

I originally started with Godot, but it didn’t take long for me to feel like it wasn’t the best fit for this project, so I ended up going with Bevy instead. With Bevy, we can write the game code pretty much at the same level as the engine code itself, so it’s almost like we’re building our own engine on top of it, and that allows us to then “just” add the content for our game.

💭 I was going to list the highlights of these ~6 months of development, but the list was getting long! Which is insane because I often feel like I’m progressing so slowly… but that’s absolutely not true, and I should remember that.

We will definitely do a proper “project reveal” next year with more details about the game itself, so keep an eye out for that!

Trips

Guarapari

First stop was… the beach! Unfortunately, I started feeling sick the day before the trip, so I had to come home early. A few friends and I were going by train, which I was excited for, but the sickness made it not a very fun experience.

At least I got to see some good friends still!

São Paulo

Earlier this year, the Wicked musical was back in São Paulo for a new season! So I got tickets for opening night for both me and my mother. We enjoyed it sooo much!

Gagacabana

The moment we heard rumors that Lady Gaga was going to perform at Copacabana Beach for free, I booked the hotel. There was no way I would miss that.

Copacabana Beach by Carolina Ale

I usually think it’s a bit corny to say that I “never imagined” something, but damn… I could NEVER in my entire life have even thought that I would one day watch Lady Gaga in Copacabana alongside so many friends. Let alone in the closest area to the stage surrounded by so much emotion and love!

If you don’t know yet, “DoceAzedo911” is my handle pretty much everywhere. It’s two songs by Lady Gaga (Sour Candy and 911). Now Doce Fernandes is my legal name. It’s because of Gaga, who, through her music and her work, taught me so much about accepting the Doce that had been showing signs since he was little.

Juíz de Fora

I have a couple of friends living in Juíz de Fora, which is a ~4 hour drive from Belo Horizonte, so I did visit them thrice this year! During my visits, this friend of mine pierced my ears, and one of their friends gave me a few tattoos.

DJing

During one of my Juíz de Fora trips, I got booked to perform a 100% baile funk DJ set at @clubecontra, which was insane!

I also got booked for the first time to perform in Belo Horizonte at @festatrophy, which is a hyperpop and altpop party that I used to attend all the time and which inspired me to become a DJ.

A true full circle moment that I’m so grateful for…

This year I also started the Combo EMBRAZA + JOGA project, which is kind of like a radio show for YouTube, where guest DJs perform for a crowd of people playing video games. This project is on hiatus right now.

Games

Since I’ve built my new PC, I’m trying to figure out what kind of games I like…

One of the most interesting ones I played this year was FALLSTRUKTUR. It’s free, and the only goal is to go down. This game has very slippery and bouncy controls, and that makes you uneasy in a very interesting, unsettling way. That’s actually the whole vibe of this game. It also has workshop maps, which I had some fun with too. Highly recommended.

I also played Windblown, Hell Clock, and Moonlighter 2. Out of the three, Moonlighter 2 is the one I spent the most hours in and had the most fun with, but all three always got to a point where they reminded me how much I dislike roguelikes.

I only played the first act of The Alters, but I really enjoyed it. I should probably pick it up again. I started noticing I really like games with a checklist of things to do.

I also played Bayonetta, which is awesome. No comments.

This year I started playing Overwatch 2. What makes it so fun to me (apart from the gameplay itself) is that I feel like you can be as impactful when you’re losing as you can when you’re winning. So, even losing in this game is usually a fun experience. It also has very little downtime (you don’t have to wait a lot after dying or to find matches).

I played a bit of Street Fighter V and NEN×IMPACT to learn how to play fighting games and… oh boy, this isn’t for me.

Media

✅ Don’t worry! There will be no spoilers in this section.

I watched White Lotus, which I was convinced they could never top the first season, but I was so wrong. The third season was fun too, but I was expecting more.

I also watched Mr. Robot, which was insane. It’s hard to talk about it without giving away spoilers. So all I will say is that it made me very uncomfortable at times. It addressed many complex topics flawlessly. I cried multiple times. It definitely paid off at the end.

I watched Scream (1 & 2) for the first time! I don’t like scary movies, but I was very intrigued when I saw it was classified as “satire” on IMDB. What I found out is that this is the best movie ever. It’s absolutely my favorite now.

Wicked: For Good released last month, and I, of course, have watched it multiple times already. For me, it’s even better than the first. But with that long-ass runtime, I was expecting they would expand on some specific scenes, which they didn’t…

KPop Demon Hunters was also a very fun watch. It’s like League’s K/DA but it’s a movie, and it’s even better.

I also watched a few seasons of RuPaul’s Drag Race, including this year’s season of Drag Race Brazil, some of All Stars, and some older ones with some friends that have never watched any of it.

Reading

I had a plan to develop a reading habit but I’ve still been stuck with The Name of the Wind since July or something. There is this video of Selton Mello where he says that there is no “right way to be a reader”.

And I hope that’s true, or else I’m doing bad.

Scrobbles

December is officially the time to share your year in music. So let me share mine powered by Musicorum and my Last.fm data:

I should probably update my Last.fm profile picture…

Giving back

I was not sure if I should even write this section, because I wouldn’t like to sound like I’m bragging. But I would then miss the opportunity to (hopefully) inspire others to also donate to projects they love and causes they believe in.

This year, I donated to the Wikimedia Foundation (Wikipedia), to the Blender Development Fund, and to the Bevy Foundation. These are all tools I use for free, and would love to see them keep growing for years and years.

I also decided to do monthly donations to Casa 1 from now on. They are a cultural center in São Paulo that helps and houses LGBTQIAPN+ people, especially trans folks. They have supported a very good friend of mine when they needed it in the past, so I know they do good.

New year’s resolutions

I really don’t like doing new year’s resolutions. When you turn your hopes into a checklist, they easily turn into frustration. That’s how it usually goes for me, at least.

I just can’t plan exactly what/how I will do something 12 months from now. Shit happens. So I’ll make plans for and do all the things I want to do when the time comes.

And if I don’t have time or want to do something else by then, that’s fine too.

I hope 2026 is good to you!