MAU Maven: Anne Ross Lyon.

I’ve been writing my members of Congress and telling them,

“We, whose children are inheriting a world of pre-fashioned enemies, huge debt and un-kept promises to the world's children and mothers, have the opportunity to change that . . . MAU is not an organization with corporate structure, this is a movement – to make children central to the discussion of policy and politics and global concerns.”

I want to emphasize that the Mothers Acting Up movement expects a strong commitment to our children’s future from our elected officials. I tell them that I– with other mothers in America and around the world – am eager to work with our elected leaders to prioritize the lives of the world's children - our future leaders. P.s. I close my letters with a reminder that our children will be the ones picking good assisted care for us all one day!

--Anne H Ross Lyon, MAU Maven

Invisible Children.

Tens of thousands of children commute nightly in northern Uganda and an estimated 20-50,000 children have been abducted to fight as soldiers. We are demanding that our government help end the longest running war in Africa . . . Thank you for fighting for justice for people you may never meet, and knowing they deserve what you, and your own children would. Jason Russell, Laren Poole, and Bobby Bailey, Invisible Children, featured in the 2007 MAU Handbook, Mother Leadership

Click here for more info!

MAU Majora Carter on PBS's NOW!!

Hurrah!

2007 Mother Leadership Handbook portrait Majora Carter will be on the PBS program NOW, tomorrow, Sunday January 28.

Founder of Sustainable South Bronx, Majora's work is taking great strides toward environmental balance in her densely urban home community. Learn more about her appearance on NOW and tune in!

We're thrilled that Majora's efforts toward a better world for all of us are being celebrated.

MAU UK.

The MAU Mamas introduce to you: MAU UK!!

You can reach our MAU UK representative here to get involved with international communities, actions and Mother's Day reclaimations.

And you can join all of us with MAU UK in space right here.

We look forward to seeing you around, and to joyfully acting up globally.

MAU in space.

If you haven't checked us out and joined us here, come on OVER!

Featuring: Linda Armstrong, MAU Maven!!

A MAU calendar is on its way to President Bush! Unusual, yes! Why did I, a democrat and an absolute liberal, send Bush a Christmas gift? Well, I can easily go “negative” with today’s politics and the world situation, who can’t? I wanted to send some positive energy to our leaders. Maybe an impressionable support person will find it and reconsider their support of a child-unfriendly policy. Perhaps the bright colors will entice an aide to leaf through the pages and think, “This year, I can help stop AIDS in Africa!” Hey…I can dream, can’t I?

PS: I sent a MAU calendar to Bush last year, and received a lovely engraved thank you note. Now that’s acting up!!

Linda Armstrong, MAU Maven

Learn more about MAU from the Mothership

Marie Wilson: featured in 2007 Handbook.

Marie Wilson

Women in power have a chance to rewrite the meaning of the word, to have ambition for fairness, a just and safe world for our families and a more cohesive community acting for the common good . . . And we need not forfeit who we are and whom we love in the process.

Marie C. Wilson, The White House Project, featured in the 2007 MAU Handbook, Mother Leadership

Click here for more info!

Open letter and invitation to the 2007 Mama Party.

Calling all Joy Warriors!!

Mothers Acting Up enters the year 2007 ready to throw out the wide (hair)net, turn up the pink collars and tie the apron strings on tighter. If you're more a stilleto and power suit gal, or a designer diva, you're STILL welcome to the party; it takes ALL kinds for this magnificent revolution of mothers and others.

We're mobilizing the mamas this year around three major campaigns: 1) (the true cost of) war, 2) the environment, and 3) and the MDGs. We are working in coalition with groups and mamas like YOU to create vibrant kitchen table councils & communities in every state of the Union by year's end. Come on, come on.... And invite your friends, sisters, hip mamas, stitch & bitch buddies, bandmates, book group members, and prayer circles.

We're gathering on the internet en masse, to find our tribes up close and in person. Sign up on our website to be alerted to monthly actions, hook up with your local MAU communities, and gain access to a whole slew of simple recipes for ACTING UP. Join us on myspace! Comment here. And by all means, holler at us with questions, comments or proclamations of how you want to reclaim Mother's Day as a MAU in 2007, or create other community actions. We'd be thrilled and delighted to hear from you.

Mothers Acting Up is a mother-led, mother-fed movement of mothers and others advocating publicly and passionately for the world's children.

In spirited partnership,
Paige, for The MAU Mavens
Joellen, Juliana, Beth, Tina, Anjali and cohorts

Find Your Inner Grizzly.

If you've not given it a look, or need to cajole yourself or another out of wintry post holiday hibernation, give Find Your Inner Grizzly a look.

Grrrrrrrr.

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.

Fearless Voices.

MAU co-founder and mama supreme Beth Osnes was chosen and announced as one of the Fearless Voices: Mothers Who Spoke Up in 2006 in the Huffington Post. Wa-hoo!


Who are YOUR nominees for mamas making a difference?

Give your values voice: Vote!!

(Cross posted both to / from Nashville Mothers Acting Up and Ms. Booty Homemaker Explains It All To You.)

If you haven't yet done so, please exercise your civic responsibility and give your values a voice by voting.

If your traveling sideshow of children and others isn't being hosted or supervised by volunteer mamas, school or another caregiver, consider taking your child(ren) with you to vote.

Yes, the lines may be long, but there's so much to take in, from neighbors you don't see often enough to ingraining the process and the importance of same early on.

Both my Mister and I hit the polls this morning here in East Nashville-- our thirteen month old came along for the experience and I am so glad he did, even though we waited for over an hour to mark our ballots.

One of our most powerful parenting responsibilities is instilling in our children the spirit of acting on values and following one's moral compass. As Mothers (and Others) Acting Up, we're in for the long haul. Leading the next wave onward by example and immersion in community is critical to the growth of the world we want our smallest citizens to inherit and inhabit.

We call for just and accurate representation!

As family and community leaders, with our partners, neighbors and tribes, we have a big job ahead of us with election day coming tomorrow.

No matter which way you look at it, we have a lot to invest in, and foremost we must create the language to speak of our Mother Agenda 'til it becomes Mother Tongue easy.

What does that mean in the practical sense? Read up on the candidates in your area. Check out the scorecards for how folks vote, and let your values speak as you pull the lever. And once the votes are tallied, consider writing letters of congratulations AND accountability to your representatives to let them know that healthcare, peace and an end to poverty are critical to our childrens' wellbeing. In 2008, these issues must be at the very top of the Mother Agenda, in which we will all be conversant. You betcha.

As to tomorrow, it is said that one of the principle keys to the elections this year and tipping the balance of what values play themselves out is married moms. That's a lot of us. Nancy over at Muckraking Mom points to this Steve & Cokie Roberts article.

If you didn't participate in early voting and think it might be difficult to get to the polls with your wee ones in tow, consider following the lead of Charleston, South Carolina MAUs who will have two homes open for childcare so that mamas share the load, build the tribe and act on their civil and domestic responsibilities with care and mindfulness. Brilliant, gals.

If any of you readers come up with other practical or clever ways to impact our voice, holler.

Soon...

Welcome to the Mother Agenda.

Tie those aprons on tight, mamas. Roll up your sleeves. Turn up your pink collars, tune in to your moral compass. Kick up the high heels or the garden-soil crusted feet. Bring on the snacks to keep up the fortitude; there is work to be done.

In these dark times, there is also light, m'dears. Our job, as Joy Warriors, is to spread it liberally as we sparkle up the world and illuminate not just how by why we're broads on-board the magic baby bus: blogging, buying, baking, broadcasting, beautifying, breastfeeding, and banding together to bust out all across the land and over the seas in this magnificent mama led revolution.

We are moving from concern to action and aim to provide YOU with the tools to Sing it on out into the streets: Together, we represent the Mother Agenda -- peace and goodness and light and enough of all what's needed for ALL our children. We are standing up for the MDGs, calling for an end to war, for prioritizing the rights and welfare of the world's most precious and under-voiced citizens, whereEVER they live on earth.

We are Mothers Acting Up: a mother-led, mother-fed movement of mothers and others passionately and publicly advocating for the world's children.

Holler if you hear me, and stay tuned for news items from all of us at MAU, for simple and sustainable action that YOU can do at home and in your very own community, and for connection to the communities that are springing up across the country and elsewhere making for one BIG MAMA COMMUNITY.

Welcome to the Mother Agenda. We are so glad you are here.