Sleep Troubles + Lebanese Yogurt Pasta
- 5 days ago
- 5 min read
Thursday
Wednesday night was a rough one. Arthur just would not go down to sleep; every time Miklós started lowering him into his crib, he started wailing. He hasn’t done anything like this for ages; it felt like his nap time drama. We finally ended up letting him cry it out for 10-15 minutes; it was awful. I figured for sure he’d sleep in this morning, given it ended up being a late night for him, but no, something was going on, and he woke up at 6:20. Poor little guy. Poor little Mama and Papa, too.
Despite the lack of sleep, Arthur was pretty sweet throughout the morning. He had his first taste of grapes with Papa (they were a hit!) then a liquid breakfast with Mama. Afterwards, we played with tennis balls upstairs, ran to the grocery store with him repeatedly looking back and smiling at me from the stroller, and had a nice, hour-long nap a little after 10:00, one he definitely needed.
He was, unsurprisingly, pretty cheerful and chill after waking up from his nap. We had some more fun with tennis balls and the plastic container they came in, and I attempted to get Arthur to eat more pasta. Putting a spinach coconut cream sauce on it seemed to help. I also mixed in some salmon that I cooked up; it was Arthur’s first time eating cooked salmon (he’s tasted it smoked and in a baby food purée), and he liked it! The pasta not so much, but we’re working on it one bite at a time.
Arthur’s been standing more and more without support; today, he did it for some of the longest stretches yet, several seconds at a time! I think he’ll be walking before we know it! He also managed to shut his fingers in one of his changing table drawers, so Miklós removed the knobs from them. It sure makes opening them a pain, but hopefully they’re safe from a toddler’s prying fingers.
During his afternoon walk with his pops, Arthur crashed and crashed hard, napping for a good 45 minutes before I woke him up a bit before 5:30, not wanting a repeat of the previous night’s drama. He was in a great mood for the rest of the evening, as he had a blast playing with the new activity walker from Omi that had just arrived. At dinner, he started doing his funny sniffy face, and cracking up when I mirrored him; it was pretty adorable.
Unfortunately, however, it was another rough night, with Arthur really resisting going down to sleep. I think we’re going to have to stop letting him sleep after 5pm. Or hope that this is just a very short phase - Miklós leaves on Monday and I really really hope he’s gotten over this by then…
Friday
Oof, it was a rough night for us all, once again. Arthur woke up at some point in the middle of the night shrieking, and repeated the act at 5:45. Both times he went back to sleep after half a minute without anyone needing to go into the room with him, but it did wake us up and leave us a little high strung. His final wakeup of the day was at around 7:15.
Surprisingly, given he had had a late night with multiple wake-ups, Arthur resisted his usual midmorning nap. I tried twice before giving up; I was a bit tired of having my nipple chomped on anyways, which seems to be his new way of letting me know he's either full or wants the other boob. We have to work on that.
Still, Arthur was in a pretty darn good mood in the morning despite his lack of a nap. He's back on a sniffing kick, so did that quite a bit. His other latest thing is standing up holding onto our legs for support. It's really cute, although it certainly limits your movements when he's using you as a walking stick!
Arthur fell asleep right at the end of his midday walk with Miklós. So we left him dozing in his stroller on the back patio while I sat just inside the door, watching him. He napped there for a good hour, catching up on some much-needed sleep.
Since he slept through his usual 1:00 nursing session, Arthur was extra hungry for his afternoon snack! He ate a massive amount of his spinach coconut pasta with salmon; I was thrilled. After this feat, Arthur was wired; he zoomed about his bedroom upstairs giggling and biting and grabbing everything he could get his hands on. You'd think I'd just fed him more vlaai or something. He started getting a bit restless towards the end of the hour we spent upstairs, when he began shrieking in frustration when he couldn't fit these little wooden blocks in their appropriately shaped holes on his own. I can't say he tried very hard either. We gotta work on this boy's grit.
Miklós took Arthur on his usual late afternoon walk (no nap this time), then they returned home for another nursing session (only in Arthur's case). Afterwards, we had a family "date" night! We all went to a restaurant out on a terrace downtown. We probably spent a good hour there, with Arthur in the stroller the whole time, and he was great! He spent the first half hour or so just happily people watching, and the second eating a baby food purée containing his first taste of bison (he sucked the whole thing up with gusto!) and Cheerios. I would say it was another restaurant success!
Unfortunately, there was still some bedtime trauma. At least this time, Arthur stopped really quickly - Miklós left the room immediately, and his screams quieted down almost as soon as his audience was gone. Hopefully hopefully hopefully whatever is going on will be over by the time Miklós leaves to Austria on Monday...
So, we had our date on Friday, and on Thursday, I tried yet another new pasta recipe: supposedly "viral" Lebanese yogurt pasta! It was based off of this recipe; I just squiggled the quantities a tad to match the amount of pasta we had on hand. I served it with some sautéed veggies, and it was pretty tasty! I'm not sure if Miklós liked it quite as much as I did, but it has my stamp of approval. Here's how I made it:
Lebanese Yogurt Noodles (serves 2 hungry parents)
Ingredients
250g pasta (I used whole-wheat wok noodles)
1 cup higher-fat yogurt (I used homemade)
salt, to taste
2 small minced garlic cloves
2 scant tbsp fresh chopped mint
topping: 2 tbsp butter/margarine, melted with ½ tsp sweet paprika mixed in (optional, but highly recommend - I think it made the dish!)
salad/cooked/raw veggies of choice (optional, for serving)
Instructions
Cook the pasta in salted water according to directions.
Drain, reserving some of the pasta water, and let cool for 10 minutes or so.
While the pasta is cooling, make the sauce by mixing together the yogurt, salt, garlic, and mint.
Place the pasta in a large bowl or back in the pot. Mix the yogurt sauce into it, adding a bit of pasta water as needed to get the sauce to a nice consistency.
If using the paprika butter topping, melt the butter or margarine in the microwave, mix in the paprika, and drizzle it on top of the noodles.
Serve with some veggies if you want, and enjoy!
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