​I often post about my wins with Claude Code or the progress on my book project, but there’s one part of the equation I haven’t touched on yet: Time. ​I’m lucky enough to be able to build a little during my work hours, but my primary focus is still being a Finance Manager. The real work happens when the house is finally quiet. ​But here is the reality: I have a 3-year-old and a 9-month-old. ​If you’ve been there, you know. My "second shift" starts after they are tucked in, but it’s always a gamble. Especially with a 9-month-old—you never really know how the night is going to go or how many times you’ll be woken up. ​The Internal Conflict: I’m a natural "A-person." I love waking up early and feeling fresh. But to get anything done on my private projects, I often have to push late into the night. ​I’m constantly trying to balance three things that all feel non-negotiable: ​Family Time: This is my fuel. I refuse to sacrifice being present with my kids. ​Sleep: As an early riser, I need sleep to function as a Finance Manager and a dad. ​Development: I have a deep drive to learn, build, and move my projects forward. ​The truth? Most days, it feels like I can only pick two. ​If I work late on a website or an automation, I’m a zombie the next morning. If I go to bed early to be a "good dad" at 6:00 AM, my projects stand still, which frustrates me. It’s a constant puzzle of trying to be "efficiently lazy" with the few hours I actually have. ​I don’t have a "5-step master plan" for this. I’m just navigating it one night at a time—sometimes winning, sometimes just trying to stay awake during a meeting. ​How do you guys balance this? For those of you with young kids, demanding jobs, and big goals—how do you find the space to create without burning out or missing the "golden years" with your family? ​I’m curious to hear how you prioritize when everything feels equally important. 👇

This is my first major win applying what @Jake Van Clief ef teaches. Since subscribing to Claude Code on March 19th, I’ve been able to show so much progress that my company has now upgraded me to the Max 5x subscription. Looking forward to pushing the boundaries of what’s possible and continuing to improve our processes! As a Finance Manager responsible for month-end closing, I wanted to see what Claude Code could actually achieve—and it delivered! Even without Azure or backend access to our ERP system (D365 F&O), I didn't let that stop me from being "efficiently lazy." Claude Code showed me how to use the Playwright MCP to control Chrome and handle the heavy lifting for me. The script now automatically downloads the monthly trial balance, populates an Excel template, identifies discrepancies via color-coding, and even takes screenshots to document numbers from various reports. I’m already tackling my next big automation project—a task that is notoriously tedious when done manually. Stay tuned for that post, as well as more month-end automation updates in the near future! I had Claude code describe the workflow: Common Reconciliation — Monthly Close Automation with Claude Code + Playwright MCP Every month-end I run a single slash command (/mec-common) and pass it a month number. Claude then drives the entire reconciliation process end-to-end, touching both a live D365 ERP system and a multi-sheet Excel workbook — no manual steps. The workflow in three phases: Phase 1 — Trial Balance Claude navigates to the D365 Trial Balance page, clears any stale filters, sets the correct date range, triggers a recalculation, and downloads the export. The Excel file is placed in the right folder, and the data is pasted (values only) into the reconciliation workbook's Trial bal D365 sheet. A full workbook recalculation is then forced before anything is read. Phase 2 — Revaluation Check Claude loops through ~50 reconciliation sheets. On each sheet it finds the last row where column C says "Revaluation" (there are two — the second one holds the actual diff) and reads the value in column G. If the diff is outside ±1, the sheet tab is colored red. One sheet (150070) is always flagged red and requires manual review regardless.