Fun with family finances

I used Mint intermittently, but for the past several decades I've mostly done our family finances the old-fashioned way: Excel and/or calculators. But after doing taxes this last year, I decided it was time to level up and find a tool that would help me keep track of and categorize everything.

Now I am really missing Mint--it was free and more than functional for what I needed.

This weekend I've been on the hunt for finance tracking software. Free would have been nice but there are very few totally free services out there.

I do have a Fidelity account and they have a really great free program, Full View. I was hoping I could make do with that, but it doesn't allow customization of categories and it doesn't sync with Paypal.

I finally settled on Simplifi and I think it will be great. I love having all of our accounts, assets, investments, etc all in one place. Everything is imported and categorized. (This is not an ad--I paid for Simplifi just like everyone else!).

What else? We started the morning with a pancake breakfast, as per our usual tradition. We ran out of maple syrup, which caused much sadness among the Freeze children. The sun was out and I took my usual walk up to Cimiez and back.

Eric took the kids for an impromptu Freeze Family Foot this afternoon, because Inga has a conflict tomorrow evening. I stayed home and (surprise!) worked on financial stuff.

Zari is memorizing a presentation about the Antarctic Circumpolar Current and studying for an exam about reproductive cycles of various types of organisms. I helped Inga study for a physics test about resistance and resistors. Ivy had some studying for math. Dio...well, he doesn't have a lot going on tomorrow, so he has been playing Brawl Stars! Eric just got out of a long meeting regarding La Maison Baldwin, which he has been helping out.

My parents and their friends just got back from a fun, if water-logged, trip to Italy: Cinque Terre, Pisa, Lucca. My mom is the expert on navigating European train systems, far more than me at this point.

Three halves

I went to Ivy's soccer game at Cavigal, which was a friendly match between the U11 and U13 girls. They had one half, then a short halftime break, then the second half. After that was done, I figured the game was over. But none of the parents were leaving the bleachers. Weird.

Then everyone went back on the field and played a third half! I was so confused!

Turns out that they kept switching up the teams after each 25-minute half, so it was like 3 mini games. No matter what team Ivy was on, her team won every time, sometimes by a lot.

I was quite chilled by the end, though. I dressed in several layers but the sun disappeared behind clouds at the end.

Inga also had a game, in Grasse, and it was pouring during the first half. She came home chilled and a bit grumpy. I don't blame her. They won 14-0.

We had time, finally, to watch a show together. We saw two episodes of Night Sky. One more to go! We also baked chocolate chip cookies, which turned out perfectly! I only let the kids have one each, despite vigorous protests. (They'd also had a pain au chocolate earlier in the day, so they weren't deprived of sweets by any means.)

I only had like 4 meetings today! Haha.

More rain today. Soccer games tomorrow for Inga and Ivy and Eric. Zari and Dio and I will probably go to another movie!

We got a "panier surprise" via 2Good2Go--I haven't done this in a while--and it was excellent! 6 pastries, 1 fruit/yogurt/granola cup, 1 large whole grain baguette, 2 smaller baguettes, 3 large sandwiches, and 1 large salade Niçoise...for 4 Euros total! I should do this more often.

6 meetings

I had 6 meetings scheduled today from 10:30 am - 10:30 pm. Phew! Definitely a record day, or close to it, for me.

I got enough motivation to do my sprint intervals this morning. And we had sun! Rain arrived early evening but it was glorious to have hours of sunlight. And dry laundry.

I'm so tired that I can't even think of what to write. Soccer afternoon for half the family. Lots of computer-based work for me, much of it feeling like swimming against the current (trying to figure things out but with slow progress). I have meetings all day and into the late evening tomorrow! I need to make sure I exercise or otherwise get outside.

Best in show

Zari's drawing of Ivy was submitted to an art show at our public library. Zari's drawing won 1st place... AND, Tri-Kappa Choice... AND, Best in Show. We just got the news today.

More rain today. Dio, Inga, and Eric came back from soccer practice totally soaked. I'm doing laundry but it will be wetter after I hang it up!

My parents and their visitors will be in Italy for a week, and unfortunately the forecast is several centimeters of rain each day! Normally the weather is sunny and gorgeous this time of year, with the occasional day or rain.

I've made tremendous progress on my to-do list today. Of course, it always has more tasks being added...but hey, it counts for something, right?

This evening, Ivy's stomach started hurting. She was curled up in pain, whimpering and crying. I gave her a hot water bottle and tried to distract her. Finally she puked up her dinner and then started feeling better. Phew. That was no fun.

My brain is really foggy tonight due to fasting. I'm definitely feeling it more than usual today!

I had work-related errands this morning (and I saw the sun!). Eric and I took a walk in the afternoon before the rain started up again. We had to cancel Freeze Family Foot.

Ivy got really frustrated this evening because she wanted to "do" something (make/craft). We got out all sorts of craft supplies but we either didn't have all of the supplies for a project, or she tried something and it didn't work out.

Le Catamaran recently opened up and I was able to show it to my friend. I love that apartment! It's just so perfectly cozy. It's fun to revisit it after some time away.

Wind and rain

All of the city parks were closed today because of the wind. It wasn't extraordinarily windy. We always laugh when things close down because of wind.

It started raining mid-afternoon and hasn't stopped. We have two loads of laundry getting washed again outdoors on the lines. Oh well, the price we pay for living here. Zari played in the rain and they tied 0-0, which is a vast improvement over some of their losses.

We all ate together with my parents and their visitors: green beans, Tuscan butter gnocchi, and lemon cheesecake. So delicious.

While Eric, Ivy, and Inga had a super soccer Saturday and were gone all day until 6 pm, the other half of us had a nice lazy day. Well, lazy for the kids. I did taxes! I got them off by early afternoon and there was much rejoicing.

Then the 3 of us went to a movie. Zari has a Pass Culture, which gives her several hundred dollars towards cultural events, books, performances, movies, etc. She and Dio went on her pass and I bought a ticket. We saw "A Real Pain," which was interesting and definitely not what I had expected. But still fun to get out and see a movie!

My parents and their visitors went to Èze and Villa Kerylos today, then bought pizza at the local pizza joint, Pizza Pili. We ran into them taking a walk on the Promenade des Anglais after the movie.

Taxes

On top of all my other duties, I've been doing our taxes. It's not an easy feat because we have so many expenditures and receipts to track and of course I'm doing it all by hand. But...it's almost done and ready to send off to our tax person!

Dinner was sauteed vegetables and hamburgers (Ivy's request) and some cookies I found at Aldi. Fasting day for me so I got to prep but not eat!

Dio's soccer cleats came completely apart. After multiple gluings, they could not be resuscitated so he and Eric went shoe shopping today. It look a long time but he finally found a pair that fit well.

It's feeling like spring here. It comes on slowly and gradually. But mornings are now 9-10 degrees instead of 4-7. I ran without a jacket or gloves (which I usually take off, even in the winter, once I'm warmed up).

My day:

yawn run shower work taxes meetings dinner socialize read write yawn

My parents have their second set of visitors. They'll be hosting guests for almost the rest of their stay! We all ate dinner together, managing to cram 10 people around our dining table.

Inga's flooring in the back of her room has 2 coats of finish installed. I'll see if it needs a third coat tomorrow. Then we're mostly wrapped up for home improvement projects this year, except for the kitchen counters and perhaps some repairs in the staircase and common areas. Maybe. We keep saying we want to get to that but other things have gotten in the way.

I have lost my motivation to exercise lately. I love getting out for walks and running errands, but properly "exercising" has not been very appealing. I should, and I like how I feel when I do.

Anyway it's late and I'm tired. Bonne nuit!

Ivy woke up feeling much better. She was so relieved because her class had a Carnaval party and people could dress up. She was a spear fisher, dressed in a wetsuit, diving mask, weight belt, accroche poisson (with paper fish attached!), and flippers. She won a prize for the most original costume.

I got the flooring in the back of Inga's room done--first I had to fix the wood cleats to the wall with threaded rods, then fit and glue the plywood in place. We were going to install hardwood flooring over the plywood, but honestly it's such nice plywood that I think it will look good just with a few coats of finish.

Dinner was "what's in the fridge?" risotto (mushrooms, Toulouse sausages, red onions, white wine, parmesan cheese) plus roasted cauliflower. It turned out pretty well.

Happy 14th birthday, Inga! (yesterday)

We had a busy weekend and birthday. On Saturday, both girls had soccer games. Then we had a HUGE gathering at our house with 4 other families and all of their kids for a potluck dinner. It was incredibly fun and incredibly noisy.

We all then walked together to the beach to watch the burning of the king and the fireworks.

Then yesterday, Inga's birthday, we started the day with a pancake breakfast. Dio then had a soccer game in the morning (winning 3-0, which I watched). Zari had a game in the afternoon, so we made sure to do the ritual reading of the birth story and opening presents before Zari left.

Later in the afternoon, we had a smaller gathering with just one other family. They arrived as Inga was starting to pipe the decorations on the cake, so we ended up decorating, then singing/eating/opening presents, and then at the very end, sending the kids to the park.

After they left, we had a delicious dinner cooked by Eric: steamed artichokes dipped in cream and blanquette de veau.

I can't believe she's already 14 and so tall! Sigh...

Today she and I went clothes shopping after school. I bought her a pair of pants and a sweater and she bought herself a zip-up sweatshirt with her birthday money.

Ivy came home at lunch very sick and hardly moved off the couch after that, wrapped in several layers of blankets and shivering and complaining that her whole body hurt.