Back from Ocracoke

We just got back from a weekend camping trip to Ocracoke Island with our friends Glynis and Mike and their daughters Arija and Lydia. We left Saturday morning and drove around to the Hatteras ferry, then a quick ride over to the island. Then we headed to the campsite to set up our tents among the PLETHORA of tiny cacti and sand spurs. Who could imagine that such a beautiful beach could have a campground so incredibly full of painful pricklies!!?? It was quickly deermined that being shoeless was a definate no no.

We fired up the grill and had a nice lunch. Afterwards, we took the kids down to the beach. When we had taken all the sun we could stand, we headed back to the campsite to grill cheeseburgers for supper.

Sunday morning we awoke to rain...which was weird because the forecast for the weekend was supposed to be mid 70's and sunny with a 10% chance of rain. Ah well...that's odds for ya. We had a quick breakfast of bagels and cream cheese, cereal and milk and granola bars and then everyone changed clothes and headed to the beach. The kids all burried PG in the sand and then, after a few restful minutes as a mermaid (LOL) a rogue wave came and nearly drown him. It was hillarious...I don't think I've ever seen him move that fast! It looked like he had 4 arms and legs! We headed back and PG took a cold shower, then we grilled up polish sausages with onions and peppers for lunch.

After we had eaten, Ian and the girls were running around camp playing hide and seek, and poor Ian decided that the backside of the grill was a good place to hide his eyes to count, since he was "it". Unfortunately, the grill was still VERY hot and he burned both of the outside edges of his arms. It happened so fast that I couldn't stop him. I grabbed him up and Glynis dipped some paper towels in the melty ice water in our cooler and I wrapped those around his arms. PG took a look at his arms and decided that it wasn't really bad enough to warrent a trip to the medical center, so he jumped on Mike's bike and rode up to the ranger station and came back with gause and aloe ointment. I got a good look at his arms...the right one had a second degree burn maybe 4 inches long and 2 inches wide, the left arm was a first degree burn maybe half that size. I put some ointment on the bad burn and started wrapping it with gause and Ian laid his head in my lap and fell asleep.

I held him and let him sleep in my lap for an hour or so and then we decided to head into town. We stopped first at the ponys and let the kids see them. Then we headed into Ocracoke Village and hit a couple of stores, and then went on to Howard's Pub for supper. Oh my, their crab dip is AMAZING! We went back to camp and waited for the sun to go down, and then headed back out onto the beach armed with flashlights. We spent the next hour or more chasing ghost crabs around. Ian was petrified of them to begin with, but we finally cornered one and waited until it burried itself in the sand, and then I rubbed the back of its shell. Once Ian saw that, he got up the courage to rub it himself and that was the end of his fear. He was so enthusiastic! He was finding crabs and chasing them all over. Zollie still wasn't sure about them, so he had to be held the whole time, but we still had a blast.

Monday morning we had scrambled eggs, toast with jelly, and sausage for breakfast. DELICIOUS! Then it was time to pack up camp. We headed to the ferry dock to see if we could catch the ferry back to Swan Quarter, and after much hullabaloo, we got onboard and started the 2.5 hour journy back.

The miracle of the whole trip is that Ian has consistantly said that his arms don't hurt. I've been able to touch them, put medicine on them, rewrap them, and he says they aren't painful! The only explaination for that is that God has taken away his pain. I've never seen a healing miracle in person before, but this definately is one! He should be in LOTS of pain...his burns are really nasty. But he hasn't been, and for that I praise God!