By Kevin M

This week opens voting on the Plutus Awards in the personal finance blogging world, which makes it the perfect time to launch OutOfYourRut’s first ever Friday Round Up. There are some great sites out there, with many brilliant posts, but here are the ones that really caught my interest this week…

Jason at ***Redeeming Riches brings the Sermon on the Mount to Main Street in the 21st Century with Overcoming Anxiety – How Worry Reveals What We Worship. Worry enough, and you’ve elevated your problems to the level of idols. Don’t think it’s possible? Read the post!

Craig at ***Money Help For Christians has produced quite possibly the most comprehensive single post on the entire topic of personal finance with How to Afford to be a Stay at Home Wife or Mom. He makes the case for the mechanics of enabling a wife and mother to stay at home, but the advice in the post will help anybody improve their finances. If you have time to read only one personal finance post this week, this would be the one.

Be sure to check out The March 2010 “Manage Your Money” Challenge: Featuring Pocketsmith – Are You In Or Out? Brad at ***Enemy of Debt offers an open invitation to participate in a money management program beginning this Monday, March 1st, and it’s generating some real excitement. Free programs and prizes any one? Seriously, check this one out!

Sam at ***Financial Samurai has made an art form of provocative personal finance blogging—if such a thing were ever possible. And I guess it must be because it’s what he does in all of his posts. In The Government Is Sexist And Nobody Seems To Care, he offers his own view from out-of-the-box on why the so-called “marriage penalty” still exists. No other site on the web could put such an edge on something as dull and complicated as the tax code.

Clare at Money Energy is quite possibly the very best strategic thinker/planner on the web. In Five Things You Should Have In Your Emergency Cash Stash at Home she focuses that thinking on the question of “what if” in the case of a lost wallet—from someone who lost hers. She makes a convincing case that a lost wallet is about a whole lot more than just money. Don’t wait until you lose yours to read this post.

Paul at Provident Planning has a series following his progress in the trials, tribulations and costs of raising “Bambi” the calf in Raising a Cow for Beef: Month 6 and it’s predecessor Raising a Cow for Beef: Month 5. Title aside, there’s an even more compelling reason he and his wife have taken on this project, but you’ll have to read the posts to find out what it is. (Hint: it’s even more compelling than home grown beef.)

Many bloggers have tackled the buy vs. rent debate (including me), but few can do it with the depth and clarity that Matt at ***Debt Free Adventure does in Is It Better to Buy or Rent? Also check out Matt’s Feb. 17 post, One World Currency – New World Order. It’s not for the faint at heart, but Matt writes from heart and doesn’t sugar coat his posts. Which is why Debt Free Adventure got my vote for Blog of the Year (see Shameless Self-Promotion below.)

Nickel at Five Cent Nickel takes on an issue with increasing importance in an environment of high unemployment and uncertain careers. With so many now involved in non-traditional work arrangements, Independent Contractor vs. Employee: What’s the Difference? is especially relevant.

Shameless Self-Promotion…

This past Wednesday, voting began on the Plutus Awards. If you’re not familiar with the awards (I’m new at this too!), it’s kind of like an Academy Awards set up for personal finance bloggers. This site has been nominated as one of the finalists for Best Kept Secret Personal Finance Blog.

If you like what you’ve seen here on ***OutOfYourRut, I’d appreciate your vote. The category is way down near the bottom of a very long list of various other categories.

Also, the sites listed in the Round Up above are among the very best the personal finance blogoshere has to offer and some are also Plutus Award finalists in different categories—please show your appreciation with your vote for them as well.

***Plutus Award finalist—please support with your vote! Thank you!