After thirteen months of not seeing Chris due to health issues of my own, I was at last able to travel to London for the holiday with George to visit Chris.

We arrived in London on Thursday morning. Koo's father picked us up from the airport. We went back to the flat and spent some time with Gabriel and Koo's parents. Gabriel is growing up so fast and it is simply amazing to watch him talk to all 5 of us adults and switch from Korean, Portugese and English without any difficulty at all. Koo's father says he speaks fluent Korean after six months. He is an incredibly smart and happy child. We watched him open his Chrismas presents from NY. Gabriel loves dinosaurs and he received a few dinosuar toys. Grandpa George played each one with him throughout the day.

We picked Koo up from work and went to the Jacob Centre to visit with Chris. It was amazing watching Chris' reaction to his father. He became so vocal and excited! Very loud. I have not heard Chris make sounds like this since his injury. It was like he was trying very hard to talk. We did not spend a lot of time with Chris Thursday night as it was late when we arrived. We went for dinner and went back to Jacob Centre to say good-bye to Chris.

Friday morning George and I were on our own to travel to the Jacob Centre as Koo, Gabriel and her parents left for Brazil for the Christmas holiday. Thank goodness for the GPS-tom-tom that Koo bought otherwise we would have never been able to drive to see Chris. It is simply amazing that it is only 30 miles to the Jacob Centre but it takes between 1 1/2 to 2 hours to get there and you simply would not be able to write these directions down for anyone to follow. I have never seen anything like the driving that we did in London today. It is also incredibly foggy here the last few days and that makes the drive a little more challenging.

We arrived while Chris was having his lunch. Chris had the same vocal reaction to seeing George today that he had last night. He did not calm down for at least 20 minutes. It is wonderful to see Chris respond. He became vocal a few times today as George was talking to him. I notice that Chris is more alert than he was last year. He kept looking at me today every time I spoke to him. In the past Chris would wander off with his gaze when you spoke to him for a few minutes, but now he keeps his focus on you for the entire time you are speaking to him. I even heard him chuckle tonite as we tried to take some pictures of him and Dad together. The staff and family members of other patients tell me that Chris will laugh continually when they are singing Christmas songs and especially dancing to him so I am waiting to see Chris in laughing action this week. I look forward to seeing more new changes in Chris during our week here. The Jacob Centre is a beautiful facility and all the staff that we met today are very warm and welcoming.

We are looking forward to a nice weekend with Chris and we are having dinner with Chris at the Jacob Centre on Christmas Eve and on Christmas Day. I will write an update after the holiday. Merry Christmas to everyone.