Mother's Day wrap up!

Dearest Joy Warriors & Apron String Revolutionaries; The MAU Mother's Day stories and photographs keep rolling in! Thousands of mothers acting up gathered in cities and hamlets across the nation to celebrate the day in the spirit of Julia Ward Howe: advocating for the world's children. We've gone public with press aplenty, witnesses to the powerful force that is mother leadership! And in a year when many events partnered with 1Sky on their collective Mother's Day Action, it's no surprise that the weather played a large role in the festivities. Here are a few reports: From Teresa in Snohomish, WA: Our Mother's Day Gathering for Peace was a huge success! We had well over 125 people and it didn't rain! Our tradition is to have a girl/woman from every decade read a portion of the Mother's Day Proclamation by stepping up onto a tree stump. We even had our spry, mid-70s grandmother step proudly up on the stump! From Kate in Northern Michigan: A great group of area women came together to celebrate and collaborate during our annual Northern Michigan MAU Mother's Day event. This year, we focused on a simple recipe for success with our theme, "Just Add Water." We honored five local women who have been passionate advocates for our lakes and rivers, and were fortunate enough to hear their inspiring stories of activism. Our bazaar brought in $8,000 -- a fantastic kick off toward our $14,000 goal to bring a PlayPump well system to a village in Tanzania. From Paige in Nashville: Gale force winds (up to 30 miles per hour) radically altered our plans for our 3rd Annual Peace Parade. Two trees fell while we were at the park to set up. Mother Nature was to be respected and lived with in all her wonder. We opted to go out for coffee instead of setting up, then gathered for our parade and cake and a spirited reading of the proclamation. We had a surprisingly large crowd, given the weather. It was wild and great and we went from one stilt walker last year to two this year. We nearly blew away. But didn't. From Juliana in Boulder: Mother's Day began the week before in Boulder with Girlcotts celebrating local fair trade stores, a performance of (M)other and Janna on TV! Then on Sunday, the Raging Grannies led a parade of stilt-walkers and strollers to gather for music, kids activities, cake and a thousand fair trade roses from Transfair/USA. Eight other organizations joined MAU in the celebration; talking with participants and hearing the eloquent words of MAU Co-founder Erica Shafroth and Jen Parsons. The entire crowd enjoyed stirring music from Danea Shanti and Ancestral Voices, including a troop of belly dancers! A festival atmosphere prevailed, culminating in an hour-long interview with Dr. Daddio! From Kate in Bend, OR: I am very inspired and unbelievably satisfied: we had a splendid Reclaiming Mother's Day event. Our first annual MAU celebration of Julia Ward Howe's original vision started off with gusts of wind, snow and chilly temps. No matter though: families still came to picnic, play and participate in the movement. David in Oklahoma City: In the midst of a rainy month we were blessed with an absolutely beautiful sunny afternoon and had a crowd of 75-100 people -- women, men and children -- who enjoyed being on the grass and even under a large shade tree, so everyone stayed comfortable. [We had] a wonderful speech by State Senator Connie Johnson, whose birthday it also happened to be. Our two elementary-school essay contest winners read what they had written on the subject, "I Want To Live In a World In Which . . . " and they each received $40 in gift certificates for their efforts. Laura in Austin, TX: Adorned in colorful tutus, feathers, and flowers, Austin mamas marched across the pedestrian bridge, which spans our beautiful Town Lake, declaring, "There ain't no power like the power of the mama, and the power of the mama don't stop!" Cheers to mamas, papas, mini-MAUs and all who answered Julia's call to "Arise!" Yours for the JOYFUL revolution, The Mavens at MAU Central P.S. MAU Central gives a huge shout out to Paige for all the encouragement, support and guidance she dispatched along the planning route to Reclaiming Mother's Day. On June 1 MAU Central will say goodbye to Paige as Outreach Coordinator, sending love and blessings to her next adventure. On behalf of all MAUs who have been touched by her spirit, we thank Paige for her incredible leadership, passion, exuberance and her wonderful laugh! We hope to hear it often in the years to come...

Boulder MAU on tee vee!!

Boulder MAU Maven Janna Vance and Lillian appear on 7News, KMGH Denver channel 7.

Nashville MAU's Mother's Day events in Nashville Parent.

Happy Mother's Day!!

More Musing from Bottomland here.

More than merely Mother's Day

Mothers Acting Up hosts its annual downtown parade Sunday

By Jennifer Bronson, Camera Staff Writer
Saturday, May 10, 2008

Photo by Cliff Grassmick

Erika Shafroth, left, and Joellen Raderstorf, share a laughwhile on stilts before the Mothers Acting Up parade. The Fifth Annual Mother's Acting Up Parade was held Sunday (Mother's Day) in downtown Boulder. The parade was held to "mobilize the gigantic strength of mothers on behalf of the world's children."

Some mothers in Boulder want Mother's Day to be more than an excuse for flowers and breakfast in bed.

The members of Mothers Acting Up say they are "re-claiming" Mother's Day, taking it back to its historic roots as a day of female activism.

Instead of celebrating the day with a leisurely brunch, the organization's members hope that mothers in Boulder will come together at the seventh annual Reclaim Mother's Day parade to demonstrate the strength mothers have when united for a cause.

The parade will begin at the Boulder Public Library at 1 p.m. Sunday and end at the Pearl Street Mall. The annual Mother's Day events organized by Mothers Acting Up were inspired by a declaration made by Julia Ward Howe after the Civil War, when she called for a day when mothers would unite across boundaries to protect their global family.

In her Mother's Day proclamation, Howe said: "Arise, arise, all women who have hearts!"(...more)

Celebrating Mothers.

A PROJECT OF MOTHERS ACTING UP, Celebrating Mothers: Global Portraits to Inform and Inspire will showcase 20 mothers of young children around the world who are involved in social advocacy and are initiating positive change in their communities. Please see our website and send us your stories of exemplary mothers who are making a difference. Submission deadline for nominations is October 12, 2007. www.celebratingmothers.org Contact: amie@celebratingmothers.org

We like her. We really really like her.

“Surely this [award] belongs to all the mothers of the world. May they be seen, may their work be valued and raised. Especially to the mothers who stand with an open heart and wait. Wait for their children to come home from danger, from harm’s way, and from war. I am proud to be one of those women.“ --Sally Field, accepting her Emmy on September 16, 2007

So what did you think of Sally Field's acceptance speech (for lead actress in Brothers & Sisters) at the Emmys on Sunday night?

It's been a hot topic around the MAU offices with emails and links pinging from screen to screen, passionate dialogue ensuing.

Ultimately, though she screeched (wild Grizzly mama, anyone?), though she stammered and got flustered (don't we all at some point do that, particularly when we are passionate?), though she cursed (placing the God before the damn, something -- which, whether you'd choose to speak that way publicly yourself or no-- not even deemed censorship worthy by the FCC (in a 2004 ruling)), Sally spoke up for and about and *as* a mother. Both as a fictional mother of a son departed for war, and as a real life mama.

Could she have been a better spokesperson with more modulated tones and less alienation from the cursing? Sure. I thought so at first. And I was so bummed that her entirely eloquent words about mothering got lost in the brouhaha.

But in talking and talking about it, and in weighing and measuring what the Fox network found so reprehensible (censoring, for what it would appear, the personal-is-political content of Fields' speech by cutting the camera away and going to silence), I've come to see that in so calling attention to Fields' gaffe in the the field of societal mores, Fox helped assure Fields' position as not a lightning rod, but a beacon of light itself, to be heard and seen again and again expressing completely appropriate outrage that the children which have been passionately loved and mothered so well, the children for whom we wait to return from war, even go in the first place!!

Were it up to us as a whole, we mothers would declare ourselves and our children-- be they twenty months or twenty years of age-- free from the violence and the outrage of war. We would find another way.

Sally, we thank you for speaking from the Mother Heart when in this present day world it is so unfashionable to do so. We thank you for wearing your Mother Heart on your tear stained sleeve, and for daring to deliver a message for which you will be both reviled and championed. A mother's work, never done, should not ever be a popularity contest, and is, in the end, done for the sake of our childre. ALL our children.

If mothers ruled the world...

Fall Calls to Action!!

At a recent United Nations summit meeting there was special session focused on improving the lives of the world's children. It was agreed that no authentic progress would be made until one fundamental question had been addressed: how do we get the people of one nation to actually care about the children of another nation?

From (M)other, MAU Live: Theatre for Empowerment



It's time to prove to the world, especially the U.S. Congress, that we DO care about the children of another nation AND are willing to make time in our hectic lives to prove it.

Congress will soon vote on ANOTHER $145 billion dollars for the war in Iraq (President Bush may ask for $190 billion, in addition to the $100 billion allocated at the beginning of the summer.) Our children and the children of Iraq are not safer and cannot afford this war, financially, emotionally or morally. It's time we expose the disproportional impact of war on children!

For ONE WEEK - Sept 14-21 - CALL your Members of Congress EVERY DAY to demand that we stop funding the war in Iraq (horrifically impacting hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children), and start spending our vital resources on protecting the world's children. SCHEDULE 10 minutes RIGHT NOW in your calendar, every day for one week, to call both your Senators and your Representative.

Your messages could sound like this: "My name is ______, I am a Mother Acting Up and I passionately urge the Senator/Representative to vote NO on the Iraq War supplemental spending bill. One of many reasons to Vote NO is: _______________. This war is not making our children safer; vote NO on more war funding. Thank you." (If you want to add a Mama Grizzly Bear growl to further get your point across, go for it.)


Click here for MAU's top ten reasons to VOTE NO and all you need to make your FALL CALLS TO ACTION.






Take action with your children: Chalk messages for Peace in public places with your children and/or friends. Bring activism into the daily life of your family. Along with beautiful peace signs and words of peace, give a call to action: "Ask Representative X at xxx-xxxx to VOTE NO on WAR FUNDING, for children's sake!"


Prioritizing the world's children is our charge mamas. Gentlewoman: practice your message aloud, stretch your fingers and begin dialing!


In spirited partnership,
The Mavens at MAU Central

Bianca Bean on Beth!

Beth and M(other) is the word on the blogging mama street....


and yes, Bianca, and all, her show is available to come to you. Just ask how!
Holler at MAU beheard@mothersactingup.org

This just in from a UK MAU man...

Hi Joellen,
Just a note to say I am still watching and marvelling at your progress.
It is great to know that you are getting so many volunteers up high on stilts although many of your photos show your ladies holding on to their spotters. Stiltwalking is like skating. You need courage to let loose of the support and once free the feeling is superb. But stilts need regular practice if only to remind your body functions about the change of centre of gravity which affects ones balance.

I do not expect any of your stilters to be as eccentric as me, but I did hope that one of your stilters would contact me back in 2003. I was a little disappointed when I heard from no-one. If you have time, have a look at YouTube and do a search for 'lampwort' to see some of my exploits on 2ft & 3ft peg stilts.
Also do a search for 'bicycle13' to see a 6yr old girl on 3ft & 4ft peg stilts. She only started stilt walking about 10 weeks ago and is enjoying the experience of being so high. She may give inspiration to some of your stilters.
Watching & supporting MAU from a distance.
Keep on acting up. Today's children are our future.
Roy Lambeth

Hip hip hooray!

Hip Mama's Susan Presley gets it, and tells you why, right here.

As You Are.

Mother's Day fast approaches, with MAU events taking place in more than twenty cities!! It's a very exciting time for all of us as the anticipation mounts and good times roll....

You can learn more on our spectacularly redesigned and made-over website with RSVP ability for each event and recipes to build your very own MAU communities!

And just today, here we are in As We Are Magazine online.

MAU on Mothering chat tomorrow!!

I'll be the guest on Mothering magazine's online chat schedule Wednesday April 11 at Noon Central, representing Mothers Acting Up. This is the first of monthly scheduled visits to chat about MAU & mama activism. This month I expect to address building community, reclaiming Mother’s Day, and the Mother Agenda.

More here, including chat instructions.

If you’re up to it, stop by to lend some support and ask a question or make a comment, and please DO pass this reminder along to folks you suspect might be interested.

Mother's Day Reclamation Update.

At this writing: Parades, cake walks, radical tea parties and other gatherings to reclaim Mother's Day will be taking place in the following cities:

Huntsville, AL; Los Angeles, CA; Boulder, CO; Carbondale, CO; Windham, ME; Harbor Spring, MI; Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN; Manhattan, NY; The Bronx, NY; Oklahoma City, OK; Philadephia, PA; Charleston, SC; Nashville, TN; Austin, TX; Alexandria, VA; Strafford, VT; Milwaukee, WI; and Portland, OR.

More cities are being added daily, and communities are taking root.

If you are thinking of adding an event or your community is already thriving yet you do not see your city listed above, holler here: beheard@mothersactingup.org

Likewise, give us a shout if you're toying with the idea of hosting an event, but aren't sure you can manage it. It is NOT too late to get your parade on!! We're here to help you each step of the way, and no event is too teeny or humble to make a big mama rumble.

Meet MAU and Giving Circle Maven: Ericka Carter.

Last year a couple of my friends and I started a Giving Circle with other women in the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles. We have met every other month since then to give to a local charity or cause. The Mothers Acting Up calendars have provided a wealth of information for our Giving Circle activities. We have been so awestruck by the work that so many women have accomplished all over the world to end poverty and suffering for women and children. The calendars are treasured! We keep them in our files to provide new ideas for future Giving Circles and as a great source of inspiration. Last January we gave money to a local organization that provides books to low income children in the Los Angeles area. Children receive books from six months to five years of age at their annual check-up; this idea was inspired by flipping through the pages of last year’s MAU calendar.

--Ericka Carter, MAU and Giving Circle Maven

The Transformative Power of Mother's Day.

In the hopes of inspiring others to reclaim Mother's Day Parades and other celebratory events, the following is MAU Maven Tina's first person account of her experience organizing New York City's first Mothers Acting Up Mother's Day Parade. Thorughout are photographs of that transformative event.

NEW YORK 2003.
I don't know why I sent off an email to Mothers Acting Up saying that I would organize a Mother's Day parade for them in New York City that first year. I'd never organized anything public like it before. I hadn't ever been that active in the past either. But I saw the smiling joyful faces of Beth, Erica, Juliana and Joellen in their wild and crazy hats acting up at their first parade in Boulder 2002, and something inside of me knew that I had to bring some of that joy in acting up to the streets of New York City.

A year earlier in September of 2001, I had given birth to my first born son just a few short days after 9/11 in New York City. The experience was shattering, traumatizing, life-changing. But most of all, I will never forget how very difficult it was to be unable to share the overwhelming joy of my new motherhood with family and friends- who were unable to fly to greet the new baby from overseas, or my neighbours- unable to smile in their shock and grief for what seemed like the longest time.

In the months that followed as I recovered and family and friends started trickling in my home as they dared to brave airplane travel again, I started thinking of the mothers of the terrorists. What were they thinking? How were they feeling? Is this really what they wanted for their children? How are they coping with their grief at their loss? Dare they grieve? Night after night I would sit in my rocking chair nursing my son and looking up at the moon thinking of them and all the other mothers across the world nursing their babies at exactly the same time. I knew I had to do something to bring people together. I knew I had to do something for my children, but I had no idea what I could do.

When the war in Iraq started, people began to descend on New York and angrily pace our streets with anti-war chants and anti-bush sentiment. Though I agreed with them I could not stand to see so much hatred spill out over our already scarred city. And I did not feel safe taking my son to any rally down there either.

Then, with a burning passion to do something but no idea what, I started an internet search and came across Mothers Acting Up through a link on the National Council of Churches website. As soon as I saw their parade photos I knew I had found what I was looking for. It was like an instant attraction. They hooked me and I've never let go since.

And so, with no experience of event organization, public planning or political activism behind me, only a burning passion, nay NEED to do something fun and spirited. I signed up. I shared my vision to unite diverse populations of mothers and others in one goal and I told them I'd do a parade for them in NYC.

What followed was a frenzied blur of activity and emails and conference calls as I realized there were other mothers out there wanting to do something and all learning at the same pace that I was. Their energy kept me moving forward. I was put in touch with another mother in NY and together we began to plan a march on the sidewalk from Washington Square Park to Union Square. We had a band and a speaker that my new friend had put together. With her contacts in NY we also had professional stiltwalkers/stilt dancers that attracted much attention. Most importantly we had an information table, which passersby could come to, grab a button, information on MAU and information on how to act up.

It was an anti-war/pro-peace rally with an enormous difference. It was filled with children and mothers and smiling and dancing and singing. We put an enormous amount of money and energy into it, and even though we spent much more than we could afford to, it was tremendously successful: we were even recorded as being one of the many events/ groups working to heal NY after 9/11 on some documentary (I can't remember the name of!) which was exactly how I saw what we were doing.

Ever since NY, I have seen the healing potential of these mother's day parades and how they bring people together. They are empowering, they are spirited and as far as I'm concerned divine. From my experience at this first parade in NY in 2003, to hearing about the Israeli and Palestinian mothers coming together on Mother's day in Jerusalem in 2005, to my long term dream of peaceful unity in Northern Ireland. NOW, I aim to have a parade of catholic and protestant mothers walking joyfully and peacefully in unison on the streets of Belfast. A tall order?! Not at all. If I can go from no event experience to organizing a parade in Union Square in New York City then I can do anything, especially with the support of the mothers at MAU behind me. To be honest, being a mother is still much more challenging than planning that event or anything else I do with MAU!

The trick I've discovered, is to take our personal pain, our distress, our outrage at the world the way it is and transform it bit by bit and piece by piece into a feeling of joy and hope
, as we begin to start envisioning and then working to transform the world into what we want it to be instead.

Tina is currently working to achieve her dreams as MAU's International Outreach Coordinator and the mum behind MAU UK. For all the juicy details on how to reclaim Mother's Day in the US, go here. To contact Tina and get the the scoop on Mothering Sunday, MAU style: www.mothersactingup.org.uk

Pie for all: New Year Greetings.

Give the world's children a bigger piece of the pie!! Inspired by the MAU Handbook, Fusako de Angelis, a Berkeley Mother Acting Up, created this New Year card utilizing the discretionary budget pie chart for the year 2006. Whoa. Click on the illustration above to see it larger.