"You wanna go to auntie Stevie's and auntie Cassie's today?" I ask Link once I got off the phone with them both.
"Yeah" he cheers.
"Ok, let's go get dressed then" I take him upstairs and we head into his room. I grab some clothes and lay him on his changing table and change his nappy. I then put him into a white short sleeve bodysuit, a pair of grey joggers, a blue alphabet with pictures jumper and a pair of white socks.
"There we are" I say as I set him down. I didn't want to put him in proper going out clothes as I knew we weren't exactly going anywhere but Stevie's and Cassie's.
"Nee naw daddy" Link points out on his jumper.
"Yeah, good job" I grab his bag and we head to the car.
"C'mere, you don't need shoes today" I tell him as picked him up and carried him out to the car. I clip him in his seat before getting in myself and putting his bag in the passenger seat. We soon get to Stevie's and Cassie's and I carry Link up.
"Ah" Link squeals as he bounced in my arms and flapped his arms and legs about once he saw Cassie waiting for us outside her door.
"Go on then, go to auntie Cassie" I chuckle as she took him from me and we headed inside.
"I love how you still bring his bag although we have basically everything you need here" Stevie chuckles.
"I know, I just think it's force of habit now and it's more of back up anyway" I tell her.
"Oh right"
"Who's that Link?" I coo as he stroked Ringo.
"Wingo" he giggles as the dog licked his hand.
"That's right, good job" they play for a little bit until Cassie quietly told me to come look at Link. Stevie and I head into the living room and found Link asleep with most of his body under the coffee table.
"What in the world?" I chuckle as I took a picture.
"Crap, how am I supposed to move him?"
"We can move the table if you want" they suggest.
"Are you sure?" I ask them.
"Well how else you supposed to get him out" Stevie chuckles.
"True" they lift the table and I carefully pick Link up.
"Hmm" he mumbles as he stirred in my arms.
"Shh shh" I try and soothe him back to sleep.
"Eh" he cries out a little bit, almost waking up.
"Shh, go back to sleep baby" I soothe him as I made my way to his room that Stevie and Cassie did for him. He settles back down and I quickly leave the room.
"He go down ok?"
"Yeah, he did" I sigh in relief. We chat for a bit and we start on lunch just in time for Link to wake up.
"Hey bud, we ready for some lunch?" I ask him.
"Yeah" he yawns as he rubs his eye with his fist. I take him to the kitchen and set him in his highchair.
"Here we are" I say as I pass him his food with his sippy cup.
"Fank wou"
"You're welcome buddy, good manners" I praise him. We soon have lunch and he takes Cassie back to the living room to go play. I help Stevie clear up before we all headed into the living room.
"Ah, get down please, you know you're not supposed to be up there" I tell Link off as he stood on top of their coffee table.
"Down please"
"Elp" he whines as he reached out for me.
"You got up, you can get down"
"Ehhh" he starts to cry.
"One" I start warning him. He soon got down and came running into my lap.
"You know you're not supposed to be up there baby, it's for your own safety" I rub his back up and down. He soon calmed down again to play with Cassie.
"Let's quickly change your nappy bud, you're leaking" I tell him. I change his nappy and left his jeans off as he leaked through so he was left with a fresh bodysuit, his jumper and his socks on.
"Tome pwease" Link tries to pull Cassie up.
"Where we going?" She chuckles as she got up and followed him through into the kitchen.
"Here, eat in here though" she tells him.
"What's he got?" I call out to her.
"A yogurt"
"Ok, that's alright"
"Daddy, gogurt" he calls through.
"Yeah, is it yummy" I chuckle.
"Uh huh, tome" I playfully shake my head before going through.
"Wow buddy, glad daddy took your jeans off" I say as he spilled some yogurt down his now bare legs.
"Yeah" he says as he looks at them.
"Ok, no, we don't put it on the floor" I say as he tipped his pot upside down and moved his spoon all around on the floor in the spilled yogurt. I tip it back up and it still had a few more bites left.
"Here, open" I say as I fed him the last few spoonfuls.
"Oh gosh, can you fetch me the wipes please?" I say as I grabbed Link's arm to stop him from going anywhere.
"Here" Stevie passes me the wipes.
"Thanks"
"Look at you silly, you're a very messy boy, huh?" Stevie says.
"Yeah, wook" he giggles as he showed her his yogurt covered hand.
"Yeah wow" she chuckles.
"Aha wingo" Link laughs as Ringo came over and started licking the yogurt off the floor.
"Ok, Ringo, no" Cassie grabs him.
"That'll sure clean it up" Stevie jokes.
"Yup" I soon managed to clean Link and the floor down before letting him go play.
"Sorry about that by the way" I apologise to the girls.
"No, it's fine, it was expected really, probably should've put him in his chair for that one" Cassie says.
"Ah, it's alright, it's cleaned up now, although Ringo clearly still likes the taste of it even with the wipes" We soon head back into the living and sit down.
"Tired?" Stevie nudged me as Link was holding on to the coffee table but was still trying to watch the kids programme on the tv. His legs would occasionally give out and his head would drop sometimes but he'd catch himself.
"Definitely" I whisper. He then tried to reach round to grab his cup but because he wasn't really looking his hand caught hold of the bowl and he turned to look but as he did, he missed his footing and went down, hitting the bowl on his mouth as he did before hitting the floor.
"AAAHHH" he sobs as he stayed on the floor.
"Oh baby" I coo as I went over to him and picked him up, letting him cry into my shoulder. Ringo came over to see what all the fuss was about.
"Aww look Ringo's come to see you" I tell him but he just cried. I sit on the sofa with him and Ringo hopped up.
"Want me to look at his mouth?" Stevie asks.
"If you can"
"Can auntie Stevie have a look at your mouth?" She checks his mouth and everything was alright, could just be a small bruise. He soon fell asleep on me and the girls started on dinner. We have dinner and I get Link dressed into his blue and white stripe bodysuit and a blue and white star sleepsuit.
"Let's get your jacket on" I say. He comes over and I put him in his striped jacket.
As I was sorting Link's stuff out, Stevie asked for a drink so Cassie made one.
"Me 'elp?" I hear Link ask.
"Both hands and walk very slowly" Cassie warns him. It was silent for a few seconds until we all hear glass hit the floor and Link crying, me thinking he probably thought he was gonna get in trouble.
"Oh, his hands bleeding" Cassie says.
"What happened?"
"I gave him the glass and before I knew it Ringo got under his legs and almost wiped him out, which obviously made him drop the glass, it's not his fault" Cassie explains as Stevie got a towel and wrapped it round Link's hand.
"Daddy" he sobs.
"I know, I know" I try and soothe him.
"Do you think it needs stitches?" I ask Stevie. She has a quick peak and nods her head.
"We'll drive you" we all bundle into Stevie's car and we rush into the hospital. We get in and were told to wait.
"Thanks for driving by the way" I tell them as Link lay in my arms.
"No problem"
"Can you pass me his blanket and cloth please?" I ask no one in particular. Stevie passes me his blue and white starry blanket with his blue and white starry muslin cloth.
"Charles Lincoln?" I get up and carry him to the room with his blanket hanging from him.
"Aww bless him" the nurse coos as she shuts the door.
"Could you please explain how's this happened?" She asks. I explain everything to her and she has a look.
"Hmm" Link whines as he pulled his hand away.
"She needs to look at it buddy"
"Ok, it looks like he still has a piece in there so what'll I'll do is take you down to the children's ward and explain to them and they should be able to stitch it up" we head back out and nod to Stevie and Cassie to come with as we made our way to the children's ward.
"Oh dear, we're not a happy one are we?" The doctor coos as I sat on the bed with Link in my lap, crying.
"Baba" he sobs as he looks at me. Cassie was on it to get him a bottle.
"Daddy, baba"
"I know, auntie Cassie is making you one"
"That's actually easier on us if he has a bottle, might be able to distract him" the doctor smiles.
"Here, here's baba" Cassie passes it to him.
He takes it and almost instantly falls asleep until they started prodding his hand about.
"Hmm" he would whine every now and then.
"Shh shh, it's ok" I soothe him.
"Hmmm-AAAAHHHH" he suddenly sobs as he tried to get away.
"Hey, baby, what's wrong?" I set his bottle down beside me and place him chest to chest.
"We've managed to clean it up, we just need to stitch it but it'll probably be best once he's asleep"
"Ok thanks, I'll just see if I can calm him down" I soon managed to settle him down and gave him his blue and white starry dummy.
I lay him back down in my arms and the doctor soon came back over once he saw Link asleep.
"I'd wait" I chuckle.
"He not a deep sleeper?"
"It takes him some time to fall asleep"
"Ah ok" I go on my phone for a bit whilst Link slept in my arms until I knew he was completely out.
"He's out" the doctor soon comes back over and stitches his hand up.
"Shh shh" I soothe Link as he stirred. I ran my hand through his hair as I knew that it calmed him. We were soon able to leave and Stevie and Cassie allowed us to stay the night.
"Ugh I'm so tired" I huff as I walked out of Link's room once I had set him down in his crib.
"Thanks for letting us stay by the way"
"No problem, we just thought it would be easier on you"
"Thanks, although I don't think I'm gonna get an easy night in that's for sure" I tell them.
"Yeah, he'll probably be in a bit of pain"
"Yeah, poor boy" we chat for a bit until I decided to head off to bed.
"I'll see you in the morning, night"
"Night" I go to the spare room and get changed before going to bed and falling asleep.