Streaming Webcam

My dad and I figured out our webcams last night. It took us probably 20 minutes to run my dad through everything he needed to do to turn on the webcam capabilities on his computer. The night before we downloaded the program. Since Travis was working on repairing our Internet, we were unable to test it then.

I think that may have been a good thing because it can be EXTREMELY frustrating sometimes when I explain computer stuff to my dad. He has lots of patience. It's me that wants to tear my hair out when I have to describe to him, over the phone (remember: he's in Illinois, I'm in Texas), how to toggle between open windows. I have to go through every single little step required to do something. I've been trying to convince him to take a Microsoft Office class at the local college so he will at least have that basic knowledge. Still trying though.

Anyhoo, after we finally got our webcams synced, I realized that my microphone had stopped working. I was unable to figure out what the problem was, so we settled for speaker phone for last night. I went through and showed him what Travis has been doing in the nursery (which he finished last night, by the way - photos soon), all the baby clothes and book, and all the new stuff we've done to the house since he last visited. It was cool that I could just walk around with my laptop to show him these things.

THEN, we started photo sharing! Wow. It is amazing what you can do online. I wish I had started doing this earlier. With both of my parents. And my friends in Illinois. It would still be nice to get this running with all of them, but it probably won't happen. Lives are busy (Chrissie just had a baby, mom just moved to a new home) and stuff like setting up webcams can be a daunting task for some people. Although I do have to say that it was much easier than I was prepared for. If my brother hadn't fallen asleep at 7:45 last night, I would have had him set everything up for old daddio.

Ah, photo sharing! That was so neat. I just uploaded photos directly into the instant messaging screen. I showed my dad current photos of the belly and all the ultrasounds. Plus I threw in a few of stuff I've done with Ariel recently and a few of the animals (my current babies).

This whole online camera thing is going to be so great once the baby comes. I am a little upset that my parents and brother won't get to be as large a part of Lil' Wodie's life as I want them to be. This will open up all new doors. I can show them the baby, live. Then I can share any current cute photos I may have taken of the little one. My dad owns his own business and his office is at home. So the days when he is just sticking around the office during my maternity leave, I can jump on for a quick hello.

I think we were online like that for almost two hours last night! I finally pried myself off the keyboard just before 10 pm so I could jump in the shower and head to bed. I was so wired from all the fun that I couldn't get sleepy until 11:30 pm. It didn't help that Travis came into the room after I climbed into bed to talk about our days for a little while. He still had to eat dinner and take a shower!

I told Travis that he needs to settle down a little bit or he is going to run himself into the ground. He assured me that after he finished putting the furniture back in the nursery and after he finished painting some decorative boxes for the nursery, he would sit down and rest with me tonight. Sounds like there will be plenty of resting going on for him tonight, huh? At least he was reasonable enough to agree to wait until this weekend to put together the crib! (I'm fighting the urge for his sanity.)