good golly!

I just realized it has been forever since I last blogged!
I dont have time to do anything crazy right now but I wanted to let everyone know that our move was successful we are in our house in Alabama and getting settled in to a MUCH slower pace of life! Ill try to take some pics and update a little later when we have some time to sit and reflect!

more homecoming pics!

James was so happy to see his babies!


So happy together.....



Paige was so sweet. She just stared at him and then she felt his face as if she had to be sure it was him!:)

We borrowed Tonya and Stephs sign for this!

It feels like Christmas in April!!!

I waited 15 months for this!!

BIIIG smiles!

our first family hug!

watching the plane land

waiting for daddy!!

JAMES MADE IT HOME!!!!! The four of us are doing amazing! we couldnt be happier. It has been a hectic week. James jumped right in and started life at home. He got home monday and friday night-sunday he took Ethan on a Boy Scout camp out!! :) What a dad!

Just thought Id send the update and a few pics!

Thanks everyone for the prayers that brought James safely home!

Soon Ill Feel Whole Again!

Today a real flight time was published for the group James is traveling home with !!!! That means we are in the 72 hour window! This feels so unreal to me. I feel like crying and laughing all at the same time. I cant wait to feel his arms around me and see the look on his face and the kids face the first time he gets to hold them! Its amazing to me all the emotions I feel. I have been checking the web-site with an obsessive frequency in the last few days and today when I saw his group listed I wanted to jump around and scream!! I know that I have been grinning from ear to ear ever since then! Tonight I was holding Paige and looking in her eyes and I am so grateful that I am not the one who has had to miss the last fifteen months of watching my babies grow! I am so glad that James has the strength to do things that most cant even imagine.
James dad and step-mom are here and they have been helping me with a few last minute touches. It has been good to have them here to keep me grounded. The sad part is that he is going to miss them by a day! At least the kids have gotten to see them..
So today I am going to bed with prayers of thanks that my soldier(my heart) is on its way home and prayers of peace for those that aren't as fortunate...

SO much happening...

We have just 13 days or so until the big arrival!!! I cant wait until my heart comes home! At the same time.. this deployment felt like it would take forever and now with just under two weeks I feel so stressed about him coming home. He is very worried about fitting into our lives again. I don't feel like so much has changed that it will be too much of an issue, then again it has been 15 months. We have all grown, that's for sure. For James and I it has been in in our hearts and for the kids..mostly in height.. haha!
Ethan is really enjoying scouts. He just participated in his first Pinewood Derby! What fun! there were some SUPER serious parents there!!! I discovered I am NOT nearly competitive enough for that! He is doing very well in school, as always. He even starts rehearsals for the spring play this week!!
Paige.. her sass is getting in check little by little! she is so very sweet but everything is on her terms. She is doing great and loving Ballet. In everything we do she mentions her daddy and how she cant wait to do it with him.
As for me, I feel like Ive got SO much to do that my head is spinning trying to figure out where to start!! :) wish me luck!

just a little blog about our week!

I feel like I'm really getting the hang of this deployment thing... two months before he gets home!! Heehee!
This week has been a great week for the three stateside Finneys. We have had a lot of fun being home and EATing at home. In general just having a routine, which we have been seriously lacking. I have started taking Wilton cake decorating classes. It is something that i have wanted to do for a really long time and the mood hit me this week so I actually enrolled and went. It is alot of fun, I cant wait to fine tune my skills. I have also had another accomplishment...I was asleep before midnight every night this week!!! I know that sounds crazy but during this deployment I have been a total insomniac!

Miss Paige has done ok, Her attitude still needs some polishing up. On Thursday she yelled at her teachers "don't touch me" and when the other teacher tried to explain why that was rude and inappropriate..she sat and rolled her eyes!! What will I do with her?

Ethan had a stellar week! He has done very well at school and has been a GREAT helper for mom. I cant say enough about the great guy he is growing into!!!

I guess for today: "that's all the news that's fit to print!"

Our Little Tiger!

So I have admittedly been a blog slacker! Our Ethan is officially a Tiger Cub. He has begging to do scouts. I finally got him enrolled and set up with all his gear...HE LOVES IT!!! he has already earned his Bobcat, as well as a few beads. He is really pumped. He really loves the other guys in his den.

I am so glad to see him happy and enthusiastic about something that will teach him great values.. Mom was a little bit sad though... he looks SO grown up!

I want to blog more...

I just have to take a minute to say that I want to blog LOTS more!!! My problem is that I get on the computer and I think..let me just check FaceBook real quick...hahaha real QUICK!!! FaceBook is an obsession!!! Its a swirling vortex of...you arent getting anything else done once you get on it!!!

So I am going to try to blog first...Face Book after...

Wish me luck!!

365 days......

Today is our 365Th day of this deployment!!! One year...12 months...365days...53 weeks...8766 hours and 525948 minutes. Birthdays...Holidays...Going to school for the first time..Loosing Teeth. The list could go on for days. Ive said it before, no matter how hard I think that this deployment is on me, being a geographical single mudder, I couldn't do it on his end. At the end of the day I still get my "hug and kiss and SQUEEEEEZE' from my kids.
James and I have both grown so much as people this last year. The changes are really amazing.
In a recent email to his dad James wrote "It is a historic time and it is very rewarding to see the Iraqi government standing up. I think it was a great thing to see that journalist throw his shoe at President Bush. Not because I don’t like the President, but because it demonstrates the fact the he CAN do that. Eight or ten years ago, the man would have been shot on the spot and his family killed and tortured to death. Now, people can exercise their freedoms much greater." This one simple statement made this last year worth while. Not only because it shows the progress that has been made in Iraq but because of the progress that has been made with in James. I am unbelievably proud of him for seeing the positives in this difficult time. He gives so selflessly because being a soldier is who James is. I am also proud of my kids for being able to see the need for the American Soldier and being so proud of their daddy.

If your loved ones are close by then give them a tight hug and appreciate that our family is apart, so that yours can be together...and MOST days we don't resent it one little bit!! :)

It looks like we have just around 80 days ( not specifically...have to be a little discreet, right?) I am eager to have him home again so that this void can be filled by reuniting the four of us! We cant wait to be a family again!

Miss Paige

Well, again inspired my cousin, Kara, I thought I should post about the little princess who lives here. Miss Paige Elizabeth makes me smile and laugh everyday. She is so funny. She says the funniest things!!! She also makes me SO mad and frustrated. All of this can happen within five minutes. Like my cousin, I honestly don't know how to handle her. She is not at all concerned with the threat of a spanking, time out, or any other kind of punishment. She doesn't care if you reprimand her. Most of the time she talks back to that anyway. If you say, for example, Don't talk to me like that...she will reply , No, YOU don't talk to ME that way!?!?!?!?! This makes it sounds as though I don't try and that is NOT the case. Nothing phases her. one thing that really bugs is that in the last week or so she calls me, Mudder! I HATE that. I feel like she is saying mother like she is talking down to me!! SHE THREE!!!

At the same time, she says she loves me ALL the time. At least three times a day she says "you are the best mom (or Mudder) EVER!!! she gives LOTS of hugs and the girl just cracks me up!! She has an amazing imagination, and i love to watch her play dress up! Most of the time if anyone asks her what her name is, her reply is "Cinderella"!!!On Friday we were leaving to go out for ice cream and I told her to go potty...about a minute later she comes running around the corner with her underwear on her head yelling "chonie face!!! Chonie face!!"(chonies is what we call underwear) her little face was sticking out of one of the leg holes...Ethan and I laughed SO hard!!! She is so curious, always asking questions...

I know this sounds weird too but I swear she communicates with my mom. She talks about her Nana..ALL THE TIME!!! My mother had been gone NINE years before Paige was born. One time out of the blue she even said to me "my nana puts me to sleep sometimes!! And when we are in Michigan she started talking about her "grandma Betsy" ..That was my dads mom who passed away in 86 (I think), I have no idea where she got that. She is a little creepy sometimes

I swear ...this girl is my penance for all the wrong I have done or ever will do....ofcourse some call that the "mothers curse" haha!

But all that being said I love her SOOOOO much and really there isnt a whole lot I would change about her or she wouldnt be my Piage

Im Going To Try This Out

I have recently been inspired by my awesome cousins. Kara has been blogging for a while now. Even though we don't get to talk very often, I love to watch what her cute family is up to!! Her sister Jenna and I made a promise that we would get on board too. I made the page I just haven't done alot with it.... I am lazy when it comes to learning the layouts and other stuff...

Well it is a a new year!! I am excited for 2009! It is the year that my family will finally get to be all together again. We are on the tail end of 15 month deployment. Just over three months to go!!! We got to spend 18 days together in September and it was an amazing time! It was also just long enough to make you mad!!! Don't get me wrong. I am really grateful that we got to see him at all. I certainly couldn't do what he does. I couldn't go 15 days with out my kiddos let alone 15 months!!! This deployment has been good in alot of ways. I have always felt like I needed to have lots of people around me, I can see now how great it is to be alone or just be with the kids. I feel like I have a tendency to invest my time in the wrong people. Not really people who are bad influences but the ones who probably aren't going to be around in a move or two. I am trying to focus on really enjoying my little family of four. Deployment has certainly taught me that i cant get this time back!!!

So I will start blogging regularly and letting the world know what our new adventures are!!!!