by guest blogger, Deanna Cogdon Miller  In a lovely twist of family activities and scheduling, I ended up at home alone with my one year old for a few hours last week. He was in a great mood, sitting on the floor playing with blocks, after having a nap and eating lunch. His happiness in that moment made me think that I had the opportunity to get a few things done - finish unloading the dishwasher, throw in a load of laundry and clean up after lunch. As I opened the dishwasher, he let out a little cry of frustration so I went over to help him pull two blocks apart. He seemed pretty excited when I sat down next to him and I immediately felt guilty for thinking that in the rare one-on-one time we have together, I should be doing chores versus focusing my attention on him. In that moment I decided I was going to play with him, take his cues and do whatever he wanted to do.  Little did I know that this decision would lead me on an hour-long adventure all over the house. It only took about a minute for him to get on the move and when he looked back and noticed me crawling behind him, the smile that engulfed his face was priceless. He moved faster so I moved faster. He'd look back and I'd tell him I was coming to get him. He'd start laughing and start moving again. After a few laps around the main floor we ended up on the stairs. I followed behind, letting him lead the way. He crawled into his oldest sister's room and starting peeking at me from the other side of the bed. We played peek-a-boo for a few minutes before he was, once again, on the move. Our adventure took us into the bathroom where we opened and closed cupboards for awhile. Then into our room where we took turns flicking the spring door stopper and laughing at the noise. He opened my pyjama drawer and started emptying it onto the floor so I'd quickly throw things back in and he'd pull them out again. This went on for about five minutes before he tore out of the room and into his other sister's room.  He paused at her play kitchen and handed me a cup. I pretended to drink, making really loud gulping noises and he started clapping (reminding me of how we praise him when he does something new). After playing in every room upstairs with the exception of his own, he headed back to the stairs and made his way down. There really was no stopping him. We crawled around the living room for a bit and watched the cars go by the front window. The song "Moves Like Jagger" came on the radio and he started bouncing up and down so we had a little dance.  He then decided it was time to go downstairs and we spent 10 or 15 minutes banging on the drums, making noises into a microphone and pushing a doll stroller around. He then made his way back up the stairs, into the TV room and just sat there, staring at me. I mimicked him and moved from crawling to sitting and stared right back. He flopped down on the floor so that he was lying on his belly looking at me. I did the same and he started laughing, which made me laugh, and we both stayed there, laughing and staring at each other. As our giggles paused he continued looking at me and then reached out and put his little hand on my cheek. He rested it there for a minute, looking at me and smiling. Although he didn't have the words to say what I think he was thinking, I found myself putting my hand on his cheek and whispering "I know buddy, I had a great time too. The greatest time." I shudder to think that I almost missed out on it because of laundry and dishes. Lesson learned.  Deanna lives in Dartmouth with her husband and three children. When she's not reading stories, dancing to ABBA or burping a baby, she works in communications for Bell Aliant. ...