Re: take vs spend
Yes, either:
It took me three hours to finish the report yesterday.
or
I spent three hours finishing the report yesterday.
An another note, I always have trouble with "to finish" as action of duration. Does that mean you had spend 60 hours on the report in the past weeks, but yesterday you took three hours to put the final things into place, thus finishing it? Or does it mean it took you three hours from start to finish? With the "to finish" I'm inclinded to think that latter, but "finishing" feels more like the former.
I'm not a teacher, but I write for a living. Please don't ask me about 2nd conditionals, but I'm a safe bet for what reads well in (American) English.