February contained the most (winter) laughter since my kids were born.

Much better than a gradual slump into seasonally-maladjusted depression!

Rebalancing & Asset Sales

• No changes in asset allocation.
• Small purchases to rebalance to target allocation.
• No year-end tinkering for tax purposes.
• Cash and short-term treasuries will fall to 6% of our family balance sheet once we make 2014 retirement purchases before April 15th.

We decided to take three non-yielding assets and put them on the market => a vacant lot, a piece of jewelry and a painting.

• These sales could free 10-15% of the family balance sheet.
• We expect to save 5-8% of our core cost of living by reducing taxes payable and insurance expenses.
• A low tax basis on the vacant lot means there will be capital gains payable. However, we own the house next door and the capital increase on the house (as the neighborhood is upgraded) will mitigate the tax bill from the sale.

Simplification

The biggest change is with my working life. I’ve cut way back with non-family work.

Six years ago, I had over 60 third-party clients. Currently, I work with 3 families. The result is a significant change in weekly time allocation:

• Kids/Spouse => 35 hours
• Third-party Work => 5 hours
• Family Work => 5 hours
• House Work => 5 hours
• Exercise => 15 hours
• Open => 20 hours

The “open” time has been transformative.

I have time to read, write, think and unwind => none of these focus on external achievement, another change.

I also have a lot of flexibility for quick trips and short-term projects. My working life is bursts of focused effort with most projects being 2-10 days long.

Kids

2011-2013 were tough. I’ll write more in a separate post – 2014 was a transformative year for the family.