Finding the Finley's

welcome 2009

2009-01-04T18:52:00.001-08:00

A late Merry Christmas from us. We didn't send a Christmas letter this year. Maybe I didn't have time to write, maybe I didn't feel like there was much to write. Our letter would have probably consisted of this. Asher was born in July. 'nuf said. Spencer and I stay busy taking care of Asher, our home, and our jobs, and our marriage.

The past 2 weeks have been busy. They started with a surprise snow day from school. We got an extra day of break! now, the last day of break, and I don't know where that extra day went. We were busy with celebrating Christmas. We went to Kansas City to celebrate with Spencer's mom's family. We had our small group to our house for dinner. Christmas eve we saw both families. Christmas day we celebrated with my family. Saturday after Christmas was with Spencer's family. After the Christmas celebrating, Spencer worked for 2 days and then left for Jacksonville, FL to cheer for the Huskers at the Gator bowl. It may not sound like much, but it was a busy break! I got to hang out with Asher every day!

School (work) starts again tomorrow. How many months till summer break? :)

As you can see Asher is much more interested in the tree than in smiling for the picture. :) This is our Finley Family 2009.
Asher is growing and changing so much! He'll be 6 months soon! He's laughing and experimenting with using his voice. It's even fun to see him mimick us at times!

This is Asher with all of the toys he had before Christmas. Asher and I were perfectly happy with the number of toys. They kept him entertained, and I could keep them all in a nice small basket in the corner.
This is Asher with all of the toys he recieved as Christmas gifts. Spencer I didn't buy him one toy for Christmas. Well, I take that back, I bought him a book. As you can see I didn't insist on only wooden toys. Some parents don't allow toys that light up and make noise. Should I be one of those parents? Maybe I should take a poll of my kids at school and find out if the smart kids were the ones that played with the wooden toys, and the struggling kids had light up and noise making toys. That's what the research says I'll find. I guess at this point, I'm chancing it. Maybe we can find a healthy balance. Maybe these are all of the toys we will ever need (and recieve). :) For now, Asher really enjoys them!

My weekly post....

2008-11-16T16:51:00.000-08:00

Asher is growing SO much! The weekend has flown by. I spent friday night on the computer trying to finish a photo album that Oprah was giving to viewers for free. The Snapfish site was so busy that it took a long time to load each picture and then it took three trys through the check out to get the coupon code to work. I got it to work, and my book should be here in three weeks...we'll see. :) All I know is that I didn't have to pay for it...Thanks Oprah!

Asher will be 4 months old Monday! He's in a fun stage of smiling, playing, and exporing everything around him. He loves bath time...well, usually. :)

Taking it a day at a time.

2008-11-02T18:39:00.001-08:00

I haven't made much time for blogging since being back to school. My days are full and busy and by the time I get home with Asher, all I do is hang out with him until he goes to sleep. Last week there were 2 days that he fell asleep for the night at 6pm. The good thing about that is that he'll sleep until the morning. The sad part about that is....I picked him up at 4:30. When I picked him up I'd hear, "he was great, he laughed, he talked, he played." yeah. but....then I got him and he was crabby and then fell asleep an hour and a half later. Not the schedule I dreamed about when I agreed to work....but like I said, we're taking it a day at a time. In conclusion....I spent this whole weekend with Asher and enjoyed every minute!

Back to the Working World

2008-10-14T18:01:00.000-07:00

Starting Wednesday morning, I'm back to the working world. I have absolutely LOVED being at home with Asher. It took a good 2 months to adjust to life with Asher, and this past month I've been able to completely enjoy life at home. It's going to be really hard to go back to work. Asher will be spending his days with family, and having a great time. I'll be busy at school, so hopefully the days will go by quickly. I may not be updating this very often anymore, but I'll try to keep posting pictures of Asher as I have time. We'll probably see you again at Thanksgiving. :)

Well, I better get to bed. I've got to get up early for work.

It's Fall....

2008-10-02T06:06:00.001-07:00

Asher is now 2 months old...almost 3 by now. We went to the pumpkin patch last weekend and he picked out his first pumpkin (with a little help). He seems to have a studied look on his face like he's always observing what's going on. Maybe we have a little scientist on our hands. :)
Spencer ran the Omaha Half-Marathon last weekend also. He did a great job for the amount of training he did - not much. He came in at 1 hour 42 min! We are really proud of him.
Asher is so much more alert now, and he's a big fan of the upright position. So, we invested in a walker. Just a simple one because we have lots of toys he can play with and as you can see he really likes his train and spinning monkey. I have to be honest and say that I'm really going to miss being at home with him. I will be going back to school on Oct. 15th. So, I'm dreadfully counting down the days. Asher will be in good hands, but I'll miss seeing him and playing with him during the day.

a good night of sleep

2008-09-04T07:43:00.000-07:00

Last night Asher slept for 6 and a half hours straight! I was shocked when I woke up at four and he hadn't woken up. Spencer and I enjoyed our sleep. :) Now, let's hope we can do that again.

Also, I wanted to mention that the afternoon after I last blogged about asher not napping in his crib. He took a good 3 hour nap in the afternoon in his crib the whole time. Guess I just needed to wait out the morning.

Game Day

2008-09-02T08:03:00.000-07:00

I find myself blogging to keep you updated, but I have a long list of things to do. Laundry waiting to be folded, piles of papers waiting to be sorted, fall decorations waiting to be put out, a number of things to be picked up and put away. This morning I tried for a long time - or what seemed to be a long time - to get Asher to fall asleep in his bouncy chair...he wouldn't. Then I put the bouncy seat on the dryer while it was running. I heard that would work....i didn't. When I picked him up he stopped crying and fell asleep. I layed him in his crib...instantly, he woke up and started crying. I picked him up, and he stopped crying and was back to sleep quickly. I got out his swing. That worked for a while...probably 15 minutes. When he started crying again, I gave in and put on the front carrier. Now he's sleeping....but it was much easier carrying him on the front when he was inside me. :) Seems like the boy has learned that he likes sleeping the most when another body is close. Looks like he and I have a goal for the next couple weeks....teach Asher to nap....while I'm not holding him.

This past weekend was busy for us. Saturday was Asher's first Husker game day! Spencer was anxious to show him the special section in the newspaper, so they started the morning reading about the huskers together. While Spencer and I went to the game, Asher went to his first wedding with his Aunt, Uncle and cousins.
Asher is really growing a lot. He loves to look around and see what's going on. He loves sitting by the window and watching the trees. For those of you who are keeping track, he will be 7 weeks this Thursday.

I'm catching on

2008-08-21T15:13:00.000-07:00

I think I'm beginning to catch onto how this whole parent thing works. I may be slow at processing it, but hey, God's had a lot of work to do on my heart. There are moments that Asher and I have that seem to make all of the sleepless nights fade away. We got his "official" one month pictures taken, which I think, means we are now obligated to keep him. I'd have a hard time giving him up at this point.

One Month

2008-08-19T07:40:00.000-07:00

Spencer and I have been parents for one month now. Asher is growing, and healthy. He's a blessing to have and we love him so much. The lack of sleep has been a shock to both of our bodies, so we have become like turtles in our house. We stay in, and take turns sleeping.

Spencer took a week off after Asher was born, and has been back to work since. I will go back to teaching at Russell in October. I'm so thankful for maternity leave. There is no way that I'd have enough energy to be a good teacher, wife and mom at this point. Hopefully that will change in the next couple months as I learn to juggle everything. I think it's tricky adjusting to one....I'm not allowing myself to think about life with more than one child at this point. :)

At the end of July we left for a trip to Michigan to celebrate Alyson's (Spencer's sister) graduation from Physical Therapy school. I was nervous about the trip but it went well. Asher slept well in the car, although it skewed the small eating/sleeping schedule we had started to get onto. He was small enough - we left the day he was 2 weeks old - that he'd still eat and sleep most of the time. It was helpful that we had so many family helpers on the trip. I would not have survived otherwise. We were happy to get home and back to our home-sweet-home.

Before Asher was born, I was really nervous about how Ragoo would do with the baby. She's kept her distance for the most part, and I'm so happy about that. Once in a while, she'll show some curiosity like in this picture. This is about as close as she'll get. We'll see how things change once Asher actually can chase and taunt her.

My hope for the next month is to get more sleep. It may be a little selfish, but I really hope that Asher learns to sleep through the night - or even 5-6 hours - SOON! For now, I'm doing my best to cherish every moment because I know we won't ever get these back, and Asher will grow up right before our eyes.

He's here....and we're not sleeping. :)

2008-07-22T10:54:00.001-07:00

Asher James Finley arrived Thursday July 17th at 4:10am

He came into the world at 6lbs 6oz and measured 20.5 inches long.

we are adjusting to life with a baby. It's a tricky adjustment, so there isn't much time to update the blog. I think I'm in survival mode. I'll get better at updating once things become our new "normal"

a waiting game

2008-07-13T17:14:00.000-07:00

for all of you blog readers out there, and all of the friends that think I've had the baby and haven't called.....It's not true. Don't worry. Baby Finley has not made his way into this world yet. We are still waiting. We're still 5 days away from his due date, which is hard for me to remember at times. Spencer and I are looking forward to being done with this waiting game. We've been trying to rest as much as possible in order to prepare for the radical change that is about to happen. We'll keep you posted....

a baby's wardrobe

2008-07-08T13:05:00.001-07:00

I guess it's hard to know when to stop buying clothes. I'm new to this baby stuff, and there are so many unknowns when it comes to babies. Will he be small enought to wear newborn sizes? Will he wear them for a week, two weeks, a month, or two months? It's hard for a planner like myself. I want to know what to expect so I can be ready. In this case, I guess I'll just have to wait and see. Maybe it's good that we have so many clothes. Now, most of these clothes were gifts. The majority are from a loving grandma, another majority are from a loving aunt, and others are gifts, and some purchases I made. I guess the good thing about having a lot of clothes is that he'll alway have something to wear, and we'll have extra stuff to give away to babies that may not have all of the options we have. We are certainly blessed, and living with more than we need. Or maybe I'll find out that you can never have enough onsies. (these are just the newborn onsies...)

These are the two outfits we are taking to the hospital with us. One of them will be the outfit that our little "scout" will come home in. Thinking of it, it's too bad we can't get a baby scout uniform. :) The blue one on the left is the outfit that Spencer was brought home in. That would be very special to have Spencer's son brought home in the same outfit. I'm not really sure what to expect in any of this, so I guess that's why I'm taking two outfits. It's making me feel more prepared.

organizing the nursery

2008-07-02T14:27:00.001-07:00

This is the nursery just after the showers and before the organizing...

This is what the nursery looks like now.

We're in the waiting stage...

2008-07-02T10:21:00.000-07:00

As of today, I am 37 weeks and 4 days. The baby could come at any time. We are anxiously awaiting when he will decided to make his way into this world. At my doctor's appointment this morning, there wasn't much change from last week, so it seems as if the little one would like some more time to sleep and rest right where his is. I guess I'm okay with that as long as he continues to behave. It'd be nice if he'd pick up some of the slack with all of the extra fluid floating around in my body making my hands and feet extra swollen, but I guess he has enough on his plate deciding when to start his journey and all.

While we are waiting I've had some time to organize the nursery, and make sure everything has a home. Spencer's had some time also...

From what I've heard, I guess we should take the extra time to relax while we can.

new windows

2008-06-22T20:21:00.001-07:00

I'm not sure when getting new windows becomes exciting, but it has been for Spencer and I. I guess that means we are functioning as adults now, and realize that our hard-earned money is buying those windows. We only did the front two bedrooms, but have really loved the new windows! First, this is a picture of the old windows...
and a little harder to see, but the new windows. sorry the pictures didn't turn out that well.

soon, i'll get around to blogging about the nursery and getting ready for the baby....

Spring Break 2008 - Asheville, NC

2008-04-25T20:14:00.001-07:00

For Spring Break 2008, we drove out to Asheville, North Carolina. We broke up the drove, by staying with and visiting, Chuck, one of Spencer's long-time friends.
We stayed busy visiting the sites around Asheville. The first day, we went to Chimney Rock park and did some hiking (mostly climbing stairs). The options were to take an elevator to the top of Chimey Rock, or hike the stairs they have made. We chose to hike the stairs...then we hiked a trail to a 400 foot waterfall. It was really beautiful!

There were definitely more stairs that what you see here in this picture. It was about 30minutes of stairs actually. :)
The second day we went to the Biltmore Estate. I wonder how many people have joked about this being their house? Wouldn't that be crazy if you lived in this thing? It was well worth the visit!
The third day, we took a drive down the Blue Ridge Parkway. We drove it all the way to the Great Smoky Mountain National Park. We honeymooned in Pigeon Forge, TN and visited this same spot. It was fun to be back 2 years later.

Home Improvement

2008-03-29T06:24:00.000-07:00

After buying our house, it seems like the "to-do" list just keeps growing. There are so many things that we'd like to do, but just don't have the time or money for. However, putting a new banister in was on the priority list. My nephew, Isaac, has walked through the old banister many times. So, we figured with a baby on the way, now is the best time to fix this problem. We talked about this project for a long time and we knew that it would eventually be one of the projects we would have to do.

This is actually Chuck putting in new locks for us, but you can see the old banister. I know it's not the best picture, but when the project actually came about, we didn't take the time to think about taking a before picture. :)

Although we loved the open feel when there was nothing there, but that isn't so child-friendly either.
This is what things looked like alot of the time. Mom, Dad, and Spencer planning and talking about the plan. I think Spencer would tell you that this wasn't the easiest do-it-yourself project to figure out. Once we started working there were so many small things that made it difficult....like a slanted wall that we never new about. :)

The almost final project. We still have some small things to finish, but luckily on these pictures you can't see those things! I'm proud of my parents and Spencer for putting this in! I can now rest assured that our baby will not try to crawl through the posts, plus we'll enjoy the nice look of it for years!

the places she'll go...

2008-02-27T19:56:00.000-08:00

we admit that we have a crazy cat. maybe she's just a curious kitten.

It's a BOY!!!

2008-02-16T09:16:00.000-08:00

Baby Boy Finley at 20 weeks. Half-way there!

Birthday Dinners

2008-01-18T15:15:00.000-08:00

We're celebrating another birthday in our family tonight. Actually, Alec's birthday was yesterday, but we're celebrating tonight. Our family loves birthday dinners. We love getting together and having dinner together. Hey, what can I say, we like hanging out. Sometimes it feels like Spencer and I hang out with our families more than friends. Well, I think that's actually true, but we LOVE being with our families.

So, here's to Alec. Happy Birthday, Bubba! We love you!

Up and running...

2008-01-04T06:49:00.000-08:00

I'm enjoying my last weekday of winter break. Unfortunately, I've also been working on things for school, but at least I have the day at home. I wanted to post the pictures I talked about last time.

I also thought I'd post pictures of the gifts Spencer and I gave to each other. He gave me this bench for the end of our bed, I had picked it out, but didn't know he was going to buy it for Christmas.
I bought him this flatscreen tv, and wall mount so now when I go to bed early, he can watch movies and sports in our room with me. :)

The Joys of Technology

2008-01-01T07:28:00.000-08:00

Spencer and I spent the days after Christmas in Missouri visiting his grandparents. Then we took a quick trip to St. Louis. Seriously quick...we were only there for 5 hours. We went to see the Body Worlds3 Exibit at the St. Louis Science Center. It was a fasinating display of human bodies. visit www.bodyworlds.com for more information.

Anyways, I want to post a few pictures, but....I left my computer plug-in at school over break, and my school computer plug-in isn't working because my cat chewed on it.. SO, I can't turn on either of the two computers that are "mine." I'm currently on Spencer's computer, but don't want to download pictures until I have permission from him. Hopefully soon I'll be able to access my pictures and post some from our fun and quick trip to St. Louis.

Family Picture

2007-12-20T16:14:00.000-08:00

Spencer and I wanted to take a picture with our Christmas tree. The only bad thing about the picture is that we are in our "comfy" clothes. When we hang out at home, we like to be comfortable, and this just happened to be the time that we remembered to take a picture.

We also decided to see if Ragoo would cooperate and be in the picture. In fact, she did! It's our family picture for the year. I'm excited to have another one in our picture next year!

One thing you can't really see in the picture, is that our tree is dead. It's true, and sad. The tree went through some trauma when it was being set up. First, it didn't fit in the tree stand, and then our cat tried to crawl up it and knocked it over. Hopefully next year we'll do a better job of keeping our tree alive.

an electronic Christmas card

2007-12-11T09:22:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas! December 2007

I pray that this letter finds you well, and enjoying the Christmas season. Spencer and I are happy to update you on a few things that happened this past year.

Last December, we purchased our first home. It needed some work, so we took the opportunity to do some major work on the house before we moved in. We painted every room, and even the ceilings. We put some new flooring in, replaced light fixtures, and replaced every outlet and light switch in the house. We had help from our families which was a huge blessing as most of the things would not have been possible without their help.

We moved in at the end of January, and spent the next month or so getting settled. We have really enjoyed having our own house. We’ve had a year of learning of the time-consuming task of yard work, keeping up the house, and expanding our list of home-improvement projects. We even put up our Christmas lights for the first time this year. It’s fun having our own place!

We did quite a bit of traveling this past spring and summer. In March, we traveled to Mexico with Spencer’s parents and a team of medical students and construction help. Brian, Spencer’s Dad, has lead many groups to this small town to provide a medical clinic. Since we are neither medical nor construction experts, we helped out where we could. I helped organize the medicine we took. Spencer helped out with some construction projects for a pastor and his family. This trip consisted of building 2 sets of cement stairs. Spencer and I were happy to travel along with family to serve Christ in this way.

In May, we traveled to Hawaii with the Tracy’s (Thea’s family). It was a long-time dream come true for my parents to have all of us travel together for a week-long vacation. All 10 of us stayed in a condo on the beach. It was a precious time with family, and a wonderful opportunity to see the beauty of Hawaii.

June and July are Spencer’s busy months with summer camp in full swing. This was his first year not living out at camp. He did a wonderful job managing the camp from Omaha and visiting camp a couple times a week.

In July, we went to Arizona with the Finley’s. It was a trip to the Grand Canyon to lay Spencer’s Grandma’s ashes to rest. It was amazing to be in the beauty of the Grand Canyon and another special time with family.

In August, I began a full-time teaching position with Millard Public Schools. I am teaching 7th grade Science and Math at Russell Middle School. It has kept me very busy, but I enjoy having my own classroom for the first time.

Also in August we adopted a cat from the Nebraska Humane Society. Ragoo, is a Siamese mix and she’s been fun to have in our home. We’re doing the best we can to train her to be a nice kitten, but she’s quite ornery!

Last, but not least, at the beginning of November we discovered that, Lord-willing, we are expecting our first baby in July! We’re looking forward to the journey that lies in front of us! With our growing families, I’m confident that we’ll have lots of help.

We are grateful to the Lord for everything this year. Spencer and I are blessed with your friendship and support. Thank you for sharing your life and love with us. We look forward to hearing from you and pray that this season and year you may praise Jesus for who he is and what he has done for us.