Hello out there in the blogosphere!  How are you doing and how is your weather today?  It is bright and sunny today here in Arizona. I have my front door open to let fresh air in and there are no wind gusts today like there were last weekend. It is supposed to get near 100°F today, so I will have to shut the front door soon to keep the hot air outside!

I wanted to share some great articles I read this past week:

• I totally forgot to mention that my blog post We Bought AJ His First Car was included at the 51st Carnival of Money Stories on April 26th by Andrew over at Earn Give Save. Thank you Andrew for the great job hosting the carnival!
• Be sure to read this week’s Carnival of Money Stories #52, hosted at the Carnival of Money Stories’ home blog. This week’s host unfortunately is missing in action, so the carnival didn’t travel this week but stayed home.  If you have a money story or experience to share, please hop on over and find out how to submit!
• Personal Finance Ninja shares some information about business cycles in How to Invest in the Economy: The Best Investments for Each Business Cycle.
• Jacob from Early Extreme Retirement had a great guest post this week by Jackie from Money Crush: Saying “No” to a New Car and also shares his PF background in The Roots of My Personal Finance Beliefs.
• Greg over at Eliminate the Muda tells a tale of two families with air conditioners on the fritz in Knowledge = Money in the Bank.
• Hmmm… Ending the Rat Race is Away Working on a Project.  If you check out his front page today, it looks like he’s been abducted by aliens. 😉  As I wandered through his site I found this nugget: The Importance of Travel Insurance.
• Young and Thrifty presents a series called the Financial Cleanse which starts here with Write Down What You Spend Your Money On.
• The Frugal Zeitgeist shares another use for leftover yarn with Condom Soccer Balls, Not Just for Hard Times. Did I really just type that title?  Seriously though I think you’ll enjoy the ingenuity of the short video. FZ also shares some frugal ideas for Mother’s Day with Haven’t Bought a Mother’s Day Gift Yet? Don’t Get One!
• Girl with the Red Balloon is getting married!!  I am so far behind on catching on my reader! The last I knew she was going to get married at the courthouse, but now I find that her wedding is this weekend! Congratulations, Red!
• Mrs. Money is having a hard time decided whether to stay full time for the money in a very stressful position working with some rather childish coworkers, or take a pay cut and go to part time in today’s blog post Putting Money First. She and Mr. Money have only mortgage debt and they can easily manage the pay cut. I say go for it!

And that wraps up my weekly roundup. Thanks for stopping by!