Penang Bridge International Marathon - Half Marathon

I did it!!

Super happy after a month away that I managed to finish the half marathon, and beat my previous time by a fair bit!! It was a 3.15am start which was a bit nuts, but that mean't I was home by 7am. It was very lucky I was back by 7am as Declan decided to wake up for BJ at 3:45am and stay awake until I got home. He was NOT happy and didn't want to settle for anyone except Mumma. As soon as I had a quick shower I fed him and we all went back to bed until 11.30! So that is a winning situation there! LOL

The run was pretty good - the course was boring though - mainly on the main road - so lots of cement, and since it was the early morning no light - so all dark and boring. The bridge was only the last 8km or so which was not really what I expected.

Automall 10km - Penang

I signed up for the Automall 10km since I was trying to do as many runs in Penang. This run wasn't too bad - it went through Georgetown - but as per normal in Malaysia they didn't close the roads so some parts were a bit hairy! I was happy to do it and pretty happy with my time since it's been a while since I've run 10km.

Bone 2 Run Penang

I did a 5.5km walk on Sunday pushing Declan in my new Bob Revolution Running Pram. It was lovely to get out and my goal is to start actually running with the pram!! The run called "Bone 2 Run" was in aid of Bone Cancer, and it was lovely to do something for such an important cause. Declan was perfect, and even fell asleep towards the end of the walk. :)

Penang Bridge Half Marathon 2015

I did it!!! Declan is 4 months old and I managed to complete another half marathon! Feeling stoked!!

I woke at 1am to start getting ready and to feed Declan before we were getting picked up at 3am. We had arranged a taxi with another runner from Penang to get us to the starting line. Was such a smart move. We also arranged to get the driver to pick us up at the end and we paid him the full amount when we got back. I will always do this- as it guarantees the driver will be waiting as they want their money!

So the Half Marathon started 4.30am and we were amongst a sea of runners. It was quite warm but not too bad thank goodness.

The run itself wasn't too bad. We did have a bit of a long toilet stop after about 5km which was unavoidable! We had another toilet stop around 12km I think which just showed I drank way too much water beforehand!

From 10km on we walked/jogged the rest of the way and finished in 2 hrs 52 mins, which I was really happy with! Ideally without the toilet stops and a bit more training our goal would've been under 2 hrs 30.. but really to finish was just the best thing!

We were home by 8am, had showers and rested then headed down to Khaleels on Gurney Drive for rotis & ice cream for breakfast to celebrate!

Warrior Operation Transformation - 8 Week Challenge

I am so excited to be starting this challenge!! This morning I went to the introductory session. Our weight and measurements were taken and before pictures! I didn't get a copy of my before pic but hopefully at the end I might be able to get a copy of my before and after pics so I have them for comparison! I was pretty happy with my stats since it is so soon since I had Declan. I have around 6kg to lose to get back into my healthy weight range, and I am already in the average range for body fat.

Start weight = 74kg
Goal weight = 66kg

My goals for the challenge are to:

1. Lose weight - goal is to lose at least 6kg to get to 68kg which is the top of my healthy weight range. I am really hoping I get to 66kg so then I only have a few more kg to go after that to get to my happy weight that I can easily maintain.

2. Lose inches - I want to get leaner - So even more so than weight I want to get leaner and fit into my old clothes!!

3. Lose bodyfat - My body fat was measured at 30% - and the average body fat % for women is between 25-31%, so I am just in the average range. My goal is to get into the fit range which is 19-25%. Even 24.9% I would be really happy with!

4. Improve my running and endurance - Since I have so many runs planned for this year I of course want this challenge to help with my endurance, fitness and running. I am sure it will - but this is a goal as well so I keep it in mind!

So Day 1 involved the intro session as I wrote above. It was fantastic. It really motivated me to think about food using the knowledge I have as well as the documentation the coaches from the challenge gave me. I have 1800 calories per day to eat since I am breastfeeding - thank goodness!



After dinner tonight my children, a lovely friend and I went for a 3km walk around Straits Quay here in Penang and it was lovely except it started to storm, so at the end we had to sprint back to the shopping centre to avoid the downpour! It showed we need to walk a bit earlier - so next time we meet up we will walk before dinner! Straits Quay is lovely for anyone wanting to visit Penang!

I'll be checking in every 2 weeks with an update!

First post-baby run

Yesterday I got the all clear from my obstetrician at my 6 week post-birth appointment to run again! Crazily I was very excited.

So I decided to hit the ground running - really - and headed out to Gurney Drive tonight to attempt 2.4km without stopping. I made it but won't be running out there too often at night... You can picture it I'm sure - lots of pedestrians strolling along and blocking the path and cars zooming by so I couldn't go on the road. My time wasn't the best but hey I just had a baby and was dodging people.. so all up I think I did ok!!

I am feeling great to get back into my running.. just need to buy some new running gear that fits properly as all my pre-baby stuff not surprisingly is a little small!! Let's hope it doesn't take me too long to fit into it.

6 Weeks Old!

Declan is 6 weeks old! I have been trying so hard to get back on here regularly but it has been so difficult. I have a lot of things happening at the moment so will be back on here more to report on it! One thing I am very excited about is a 8 week fitness challenge I am starting on 13 April with a Bootcamp company over here. It is from all reports pretty full on and intense but I am excited!

I will be on in the next few weeks with all the details about the challenge, and also with my new fitness goals now I can run again!

Here are some 6 week pics of Declan.

Chinese New Year

Tomorrow is Chinese New Year which is the start of the Year of the Goat. Here is a little excerpt I found about Chinese New Year.

According to Chinese astrology, each year (starting from Chinese New Year) is associated with an animal sign, occurring in a 12-year cycle. 2015 is a year of the Goat.

The Goat comes 8th in the Chinese zodiac. The 12 zodiac animals are: Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Rooster, Dog, and Pig.

The Luckiest Things for "Goats"

According to Chinese astrology, each animal zodiac has its own lucky numbers, lucky days, lucky colors, lucky flowers, and a best direction.

Here are the Goat's:
Lucky Colours: brown, red, purple
Lucky Numbers: 2, 7
Lucky Flowers: carnation, primrose
Year of Birth: 1919, 1931, 1943, 1955, 1967, 1979, 1991, 2003, 2015, 2027

The Goat's Personality: Calm, Gentle...

People born in a year of the Goat are generally believed to be gentle mild-mannered, shy, stable, sympathetic, amicable, and brimming with a strong sense of kindheartedness and justice.

They have very delicate thoughts, strong creativity, and perseverance, and acquire professional skills well. Although they look gentle on the surface, they are tough on the inside, always insisting on their own opinions in their minds. They have strong inner resilience and excellent defensive instincts.

Though they prefer to be in groups, they do not want to be the center of attention. They are reserved and quiet, most likely because they like spending much time in their thoughts. Goats like to spend money on fashionable things that give them a first class appearance. Although goats enjoy spending money on the finer things in life, they are not snobbish.

Today at school the children celebrated Chinese New Year a day early because they are off for a long weekend for mid term break as of tomorrow.

We had a great morning - they had activities including dragon dance, lion dancing, tossing of the Yeesang, karate demonstration, drumming demonstration, fan making and a few other fun activities. Lots of families went to watch including us. It was a great morning.

The dragon dance

Isabel with her fan she made

The lion dance

Keenan tossing the yee sang with his class

Our Penang Apartment

We have been moved into our apartment since early December and I have finally got it mostly organised! I still have a lot to do in bub's room and deciding whether I need to move some furniture around but I will show you what I mean below. So here are some pictures of what we are dealing with in our massive place!! 5 bedrooms - need I say more?!

I will start off with our main living area and views - just love this part!

The view from our apartment - just gorgeous!!

Our "formal" dining area on the left which usually ends up with the kids laptops when they are doing their homework, and our living area on the right. The lounges are super comfortable and we ended up buying a new Smart TV so we can live stream the AFL when the season starts!

Our study area with an extra lounge chair (not too sure what this is for but the boys tend to sit here and play their iPads), and then the bar area. We haven't done much with this yet, but we are thinking we will get a little bar fridge and lots of bottles of alcohol and hopefully have cute a few social gatherings making cocktails! :)

Our kitchen and breakfast table - the kitchen is pretty basic but does the job. Initially when I saw the photos of the apartment the kitchen left me a bit concerned as we have been so spoilt in our last house with an amazing brand new kitchen, but to my surprise it isn't too bad. We have a walk in pantry so that is where I put most of our big appliances when not using so our cupboard space is workable with what we have!

Our fridges. When we moved in we only had the black one which was no where near enough space for a family of 5 (almost 6) so I asked our landlord if they would supply another. They had the green one sitting in another apartment so we were lucky to not have to buy one. It is pretty old and basic but does the job!

We were very lucky to have a dishwasher supplied - this is not common practice over here. Funnily enough when we moved in the dishwasher was facing towards the window so we couldn't open the door fully. Thankfully our landlord organised for a tradesman to come and turn it around - much more practical. Behind the dishwasher is the washing machine, and in the little room behind is our amah's store room which includes our dryer and where our clothes airers are and just storage.

The view out of the kitchen window to the back of our apartment block - so not too much to see really.

The view from the kitchen with our breakfast table and then our formal dining table. It is pretty spacious.

Now the children's bedrooms.

Here is Isabel's room. She has the second master so she has an ensuite to herself. She has made it pretty girly but we still need to get her a big rug and some more decorations.

Here is Keenan's room. Keenan originally had two single beds in his room, so now he only has one he has plenty of room. He and Aidan are right next to each other and share a bathroom.

Aidan's room - Aidan's room originally only had the futon, so we moved one of the single beds from Keenan in here. It's an odd sized room but Aidan seems to like it, and he likes having the futon so he can lounge on it.

We don't have any artwork in the boys rooms as they don't have many hooks and the plastic 3M ones don't work. We have to check if we can put in proper hooks as I would love to get some proper artwork up for them. :-)

Here is our spare room - aka baby Murray's room. This has a King Sized bedroom suite (which we haven't used yet - hence no sheets!) as well as the cot. Because Keenan's room has so much space I am thinking of putting this bed in there and then putting his single bed in bub's room so free up space so we can fit the change table and maybe a bookcase / chest of drawers, as the wardrobe is full of BJ's work clothes. Not sure if I will though as it seems like a massive effort.

Finally here is our room which is just crazily big - it has enough room for us to have bub's change table and bassinet near my side of the bed, as well as a big TV, dressing table, big wardrobe and we have an ensuite. I haven't taken pics of the bathrooms because they are all similar - very dated and dark, and not terribly exciting.