Mother's Day Fundraiser for MAU.

So perhaps you're going to reclaim Mother's Day an wrest the holiday from the profiteers of the big box stores and sappy commercials with a parade, a vigil a rally or a simple lunch from your well tended garden. But you still want to show mama some extra love. (And remember, mama might be YOU, or a girlfriend, or your sisters...)

Straight outta Boulder, home of the MAU Mothership, comes Boulder's Best Organics with beautifully handcrafted goods that'll nourish mama, align spending power with good practices, AND help fund the movement with a part of each purchase going straight to MAU. See the below description and details, and you can visit their website to see the products.

Mother’s Day Gift Fundraiser

Beautiful. Convenient. Eco-friendly. This Mother’s Day, Boulder’s Best Organics is offering something special for moms everywhere – organic Gift Collections and donations to MAU! This great gift is all organic and all from Boulder, CO! It includes a tea assortment, three-part facial care, essential oils candle, herbal soap, mints, and a lavender plant. Even the attractive Presentation Box is reusable and filled with eco-friendly cushioning. On top of all this, $5 of every Gift is donated to Mother’s Acting Up! Ordering is easy at www.BouldersBestOrganics.com, or at 303.499.ORGANIC (6742). Be sure to enter coupon code MAU for the donation, and share this idea with friends!

MAUs in Northern Michigan.

Kate and Copland, community organizers and facilitators of the Northern Michigan MAU community have started a blog! Check them out.

We Heart You, Madam Speaker of the House!!

A great quote from Nancy Pelosi in the Scholastic News for Kids, March 5, 2007 Edition 4:

“When people ask me what are the three most important issues today in Congress, I always say the same thing: our children, our children, our children. Their health, their education, their economic security, their families, their environment...and, of course, a world at peace in which they can thrive.”

Join Up! (in the news.)

... in which Colorado MAUs advocate for the right to education for all.

MAU at Compass Conference this weekend.

This weekend I’ll be leading the workshop MAU Now: The Joy of Activism—Mobilizing the Mamas. You can see below for a full on description of my workshop and a number of other wonderful workshops and events of the Tennessee Alliance for Progress annual Compass Conference. Nashville's Mothers Acting Up community organizers will be providing childcare w/ snacks and activities for the smalls so mamas and papas can do some activating. Childcare will be available from 9 AM – 2:30 PM with the understanding that parents will check in and take their children during breaks and mealtime. If you require childcare or intend to take my workshop, please holler at me, as it will allow better planning on my part.

More on Mothers Acting Up: www.mothersactingup.org

More on Nashville Mothers Acting Up: www.nashvillemau.blogspot.com

I hope to see some of y’all this weekend!!

In peace,

Paige La Grone Babcock

paige@mothersactingup.org

How would you like to spend this Saturday day listening to inspired speakers, networking with like-minded people, engaging in passionate discussion about pressing social issues, watching informative documentary films, grooving to great music and browsing a unique bookshop with hard-to-find books you've been looking for?

If this is your cup of tea, you need to attend the Compass IV Conference this Saturday, April 14, 9 am to 4 pm at Cohn Adult Learning Center, 4805 Park Avenue in West Nashville. The action packed agenda includes 12 workshops, including a free workshop on Global Warming, films, music, a bookshop and Keynote Speakers David Sirota and Paul Waldman. You can register at www.tennesseeallian ceforprogress.org. Cost is $25 per day. If you need financial assistance in order to attend, contact nellrose@earthlink.net.

Here's the agenda for Saturday.

Compass IV Workshops – Saturday, April 14, 2007, Cohn Adult Learning Center

Registration: 8 AM to 9 AM

Welcome and Report from Friday’s Strategy Session: 9 AM - AUDITORIUM – Dan Joranko, Tennessee Alliance for Progress Board Chair

Keynote Address: 9:15 AM – AUDITORIUM – Paul Waldman, of Media Matters for America, author of Being Right Is Not Enough: What Progressives Must Learn From Conservative Success.

Break and Paul Waldman Booksigning: 10:15 AM

Morning Workshops: 10:30 to 11:50 AM

Doing Justly – LIBRARY – a workshop on faith, spirituality, morality and politics organized by TAP’s Doing Justly Project: Integrating Our Deepest Spiritual Beliefs Into Our Professional and Public Lives. Presenters: Dan Joranko, Tamara Ambar Losel, Ted Parks, Melissa Spas, and Harmon Wray.

Reducing Poverty and Inequality in Tennessee: What Works - ROOM 209. This workshop will look at successful programs and policies that are being used here and abroad. Presenters: Martha Wettemann of Tennessee State Employees Association, Rebekah Jordan, Midsouth Interfaith Network for Economic Justice, Jerry Lee of Tennessee AFL/CIO, and a representative of the Vanderbilt employee living wage movement.

Activism 101 - ROOM 201. Want to get active and make a difference but don’t know where to start? This workshop is for you. Presenters: Keith Caldwell, Coordinator, Nashville Peace and Justice Center, Jen Cartwright, former Education Director, Nashville Peace and Justice Center, and Megan Mecaraeg, Organizer, Jobs with Justice.

MAU Now: The Joy of Activism— Mobilizing the Mamas – ROOM – tbd.
(Fathers and all others who care about & for children are warmly welcome).

Mothers Acting Up will facilitate a conversation about parental activism: where are we on our current journey? What are the barriers and obstacles to parental activism? How can we overcome them? We will view Mothers Acting Up, the movie and participants will receive a copy of the Mothers Acting Up 2007 Mother Leadership Handbook and Engagement calendar. The Mother Agenda will be addressed and issues of the workshop include community building, Mother’s Day Reclamation, tabling, and advocacy for children in the offices of our representatives. Children’s activities and daycare provided.

Please contact nellrose@earthlink.net if you will need childcare. Presenter: Paige La Grone Babcock. paige@mothersactingup.org

Media Reform – ROOM 203- Learn what’s wrong with the corporate media and how you can become a media activist. Presenters: Ginny Welsch of Radio Free Nashville, Mary Mancini of Liberadio(!) and Elliott Mitchell is of Metropolitan Educational Access Corporation.

How to Write Op-Eds That Get Published - ROOM 204. - Get read! Get heard! Get blogged! Learn how to bring your activism onto the opinion pages of Tennessee’s newspapers, on airwaves, and into cyberspace. This workshop that will show you how to leverage your activism through the commentary continuum. The Forum is working to increase progressive voices in the mainstream media. Presenters: American Forum Executive Director Denice Zeck and Elizabeth Barger Chair of the Tennessee Editorial Forum.

Lunch: Noon to 1 PM – DOWNSTAIRS CAFETERIA

Films: 12:10 PM to 1:00 PM – DOWNSTAIRS CAFETERIA.
Collateral Damage: Bad Medicine in Tennessee
Scenes from Eternal Vigilance: The Fight To Save Our Election System, Q&A with filmmaker David Earnhardt.

Afternoon Workshops: 1:00 to 2:30 PM

Global Climate Change – AUDITORIUM - A Powerpoint presentation based on Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth. Presenters: Jennifer Tlumak, a graduate of Al Gore’s Climate Project and Rev. Jim Deming of Tennessee Interfaith Power and Light and Northwest Earth Institute. FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. Part of the Step-It-Up April 14 Campaign.

Afternoon Workshops: 1:10 to 2:30 PM

Passing the Torch: Youth Activism – LIBRARY - This workshop will be led by youth and adult staff working with Oasis Community IMPACT (OCI). OCI works with young people from two East Nashville High Schools, Stratford and Maplewood, to promote educational and economic equity for urban students, schools, and neighborhoods by cultivating grassroots leadership through a youth organizing strategy. This workshop will provide participants the opportunity to learn more about this work, to better understand why working with youth is critical, and some effective strategies for working with a new generation of change-makers.

Progressive Blogging – ROOM 121 - Sandy Smith Madsen of the award-winning blog, Tennessee Guerilla Women will bring together bloggers to share the secrets of their craft. Presenters: Chiara at Thoughts of an Average Woman, Callie at Red State Exile, and Rick at Coyote Chronicles.

Election 2008 – ROOM 203. Discussion of local, state and national candidates, voter suppression, paper-trail ballot boxes and other issues. Presenters: Dr. Sekou Franklin, MTSU Political Science Department, Jim Grinstead, Democracy for Tennessee, Chick Westover, Gathering to Save Our Democracy, and Seanna Brandmeir, President Tennessee Young Democrats.

Tennesseee’s Health Care Crisis – ROOM 201 - Discussion of uninsured problem, TennCare, single payer proposals and other options. Presenters: Dr. Jim Powers of Vanderbilt Medical Center, with Lori Smith of Tennessee Health Care Campaign, Jim Hudson of Physicians NAT Health Plan and Dr. Richard Braun.

The Politics of Crime and Punishment in Tennessee – ROOM 204 - Topics will include prison privatization, death penalty, racism in the criminal justice system, and restorative transformative justice as an alternative to our present retributive system. Presenters: Harmon Wray of Vanderbilt Program on Faith and Criminal Justice, Stacy Rector of Tennessee Coalition to Abolish State Killing and Gail Tyree of Grassroots Leadership of Memphis.

Break: 2:30 to 2:45 PM

Music: 2:45 PM - AUDITORIUM - Renown Songwriter/Artist Robert Ellis Orrall will perform his hit “Al Gore” and other selections.

Keynote Address: 3:00 PM – AUDITORIUM – Activist and Media Commentator David Sirota, author of Hostile Takeover: How Big Money & Corruption Conquered Our Government – and How We Take It Back.

David Sirota Book Signing: 4:00 – 4:20 PM

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.

Conference on World Affairs in Boulder.

Conference on World Affairs Concurrent Events
Education, Microcredit, & Global Health Series

Presented by RESULTS, Mothers Acting Up, Boulder Friends of UNICEF & Engineers without Borders (CU Chapter)
April 10 - 12, 2007
On the CU-Boulder Campus

Tuesday, April 10, 4:00 - 5:30 p.m. (Clare Small 207)
Can Microcredit End Poverty?

Panel: Bob Sample, RESULTS; Sue Dorsey, Executive Director, Friendship Bridge; Kerston Hostetter, Executive Director, Microbusiness Development Corporation

Wednesday, April 11, 10:00 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. (UMC 457)
AIDS, TB & Malaria: the Three Diseases of Poverty

Moderator: Christopher Smith, Executive Director, Boulder County AIDS Project
Panel: Dr. David Cohn, University of Colorado, Dr. Robert Belknap, University of Colorado; Jennifer Braun, International Midwife Assistance

Thursday, April 12, 11:15 - 12:00 noon (Norlin Quad – at the front of the library)
JOIN UP! To Send Children to School Around the World
Honorary Join-Up Leader: Magdaleno (Leno) Rose-Avila
www.sendmyfriend.org

(PS Harry Bellefonte will be presenting at Macky at 1pm on Thursday)

Thursday, April 12, 4:00 - 5:30 p.m. (Clare Small 207)
Health Care for All: An Idea Whose Time Has Come?

Moderator: Howie Wolf, MD
Panel: Dr. Elinor Christiansen, President, Health Care for All Colorado (HCAC); Barry Keene, Business Consultant, HCAC; John Brackney, President, South Metro Denver Chamber & former Arapahoe County Commissioner

More Information: http://www.resultscolorado.org

Of noses, bums, and tall trees.

As women and mothers, we're the largest consumers for our households and families. Where we put the money speaks volumes about what we value. Which is why, when I look around my own home at the tail end of colds, pollen takeover, ear and upper respiratory infections, I see just how much tissue we've been using.

Adhering to the MAU principle of following the money and affirming with support, I look for ways to throw my monetary and ethical weight behind the Mother Agenda, looking away from Kleenex and toward products that are kind on my wallet, my baby's nose, and ancient forests.

For forest friendly tissue products, when cloth just won't do, I'll be printing this list for handy fridge reference where it can nestle up to my running grocery and household list. I encourage you mamas to do same.

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.

Shut down: build community, save energy.

Here's what this blogger will be doing this weekend instead of spending time here.

Nashville MAUs at peace rally & march.

You can find details over at Ms. Booty Homemaker Explains It All To You.

MAU at Tennessee Alliance for Progress annual conference.

TAP's Annual Compass conference details can be found here, and MAU's workshop overview is as follows:

Mothers Acting Up presents MAU now!: the Joy of Activism— Mobilizing the Mamas

(Fathers and all others who care about & for children are WARMLY WELCOME!)

MAU will facilitate a conversation about parental activism: where are we on our current journey? What are the barriers and obstacles to parental activism? How can we overcome them? We will view Mothers Acting Up, the movie, which gives a terrific overview of the movement: a magnificent revolution to honor the promise of our children’s lives.

The workshop will provide a copy of the Mothers Acting Up 2007 Mother Leadership Handbook and Engagement calendar for each participant family.

Points of focus in context of the Mother Agenda : community building, Mother’s Day Reclamation, tabling, and advocacy for children in the offices of our representatives. The goal of our sessions is to provide each participant with the tools to create and put on a Mother’s Day Parade or other reclamation event and / or start a Mothers Acting Up Community in their own hometowns.

A children’s workshop / activity—Mini MAUs in Community-- on Global Citizenship will coincide with the adult programming.

Speaking to the call for a Mother Agenda.

THIS IS NOT A CANDIDATE ENDORSEMENT, it’s a hopeful sign that when one leads others will follow!

John Edwards is listening to our call for a *Mother Agenda:

Yesterday, I delivered a speech in New Hampshire where I laid out a transformational change agenda to guarantee universal health care, stop global warming, close the education gap, end poverty at home, and make America more secure through an historic effort to reduce poverty across the globe.

Some Highlights:

• I outlined a plan I call "College for Everyone" that will pay for the first year of college for any student in America who needs it and is willing to work part-time.
  
• We need transformational change to stop global warming and create a new energy economy that helps fuel the growth of a secure middle class in the 21st century. By changing our energy infrastructure and investing in research, development and deployment of alternative energy technologies, we can create more than a million new jobs in America. We must set an example for the world by implementing a cap on carbon emissions and through dramatically increasing our national and individual energy efficiency.
  
• There's one other subject I talked about yesterday that is very important to me personally—and to the security of America. And that's global poverty. So yesterday I outlined my plan to tackle global poverty head on. We will launch a worldwide effort to bring primary education to every corner of the globe. We will invest in preventive health care through clean water and sanitation systems to give poor families a chance at healthy lives. We will provide the tools of local entrepreneurship and active citizenry that are the cornerstones of stable prosperity. And we will create a cabinet level position in the White House to elevate all our national efforts at eradicating poverty worldwide.

You can link to Edwards' full speech here.


* MAU is mobilizing the mamas in 2007 to build three major campaigns, collectively called the Mother Agenda: 1) Protect our global family: Champion the MDGs 2) For children’s sake: Preserve our planet, and 3) The true cost of war: Measure the impact on children . We are working in coalition with groups and mamas like YOU to educate our communities and decision makers about these three campaigns and build the political will to shape policies and redistribute money to care for our global family & planet. These three campaigns will run through all MAU’s Web actions, collective actions and field trips — the first action being a letter to our Congressional leaders, introducing ourselves and the Mother Agenda. Sign on to a part of the Mother Agenda here.

Greening up the post.

For a dime a day Greendimes will stop your junkmail, reduce paper use and waste, AND plant a tree for you each month. You can even sign up to give a gift membership.

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

Mobilizing the Mamas on MySpace.

Beth of Beth's Blog raps on effective use of MySpace for non-profit organizations. Her short list of organizations visited include Mothers Acting Up, and it looks as though we'll be speaking with her further about our MySpace experience.

Haven't joined us there yet? Come on over! We're finding MySpace to be a very effective tool for community building, networking and branding.

Actionable: Health Care for All Children.

A great many of us in this country have struggled to provide and keep healthcare for our families for various reasons. Sadly, we have not always been successful. It is a growing problem nationwide, and is especially so for our country's children.

The below is from the THCC (Tennessee Health Care Campaign), but the SCHIP reauthorization campaign is NATIONwide, so folks from all states are needed to raise their voices. SCHIP is State Children's Health Insurance Program.

It's easy to call and you don't have to sound like a policy wonk, just like a parent concerned for children. When you call, identify yourself, your city. If you don't know your representative, don't let that stop you. The operator will know where to direct your call by where you are calling from-- whoever you speak with will simply take a message and note your concern.

Children's Health Insurance - Calls are needed this week to Congress: Calls to ALL Senators and Representatives are needed now. Tell them we need at least $60 billion in new money for the SCHIP program for Reauthorization. Call Congress, toll-free 1-800-828-0498 What you should say? Congress must ensure that there are at least enough funds to cover the children who are eligible for SCHIP, but not yet enrolled. to do this, we will need at least $60 billion in new federal funds over the next 5 years. No child should lose coverage because there are not enough federal funds. The $60 billion includes funding to ensure that no one currently enrolled in the program will lose coverage because of a lack of federal funds. For more details, click here.

Meet Rita Sharmu: MAU Handbook Portrait.

There is a formula for ending extreme poverty within our children's lifetimes: money + mothers. When mothers get hold of money, good things happen. Girls go to school, kids get more protein, babies get immunized and moms are safer from violence and HIV/AIDS.

Ritu Sharma, Co-Founder and President of the Women's Edge Coalition, featured in the 2007 MAU Handbook, Mother Leadership

Click here for more info!

Get Your Parade On...

Arise!!

Marching to the tune of Mother Leadership in 2007, this Mothers Day-- May 13-- MAUs from coast to coast will be getting their parade on from New York City and the Bronx, to Austin, Nashville, Boulder and Carbondale, Alexandria, Vashon Island and the Twin Cities, too... More cake walks, teas, rallys and parades being added in cities and communities across the country weekly!!

Find a Mothers Day Parade near you, and / or watch the following, and get inspired to to host your very own! The MAUmas at the Mothership will be with you every step of the way and I stand ready to encourage, support, hand hold where necessary and celebrate YOUR community's victory in taking great strides in this magnificent revolution in the names of all our children: