Sweet Tea: It takes a village

When I was a single, childless writer, I bemoaned the dreaded news: a beloved columnist has a kid. The next years would feature endless discussion on the tedious challenges and joys of parenthood. We get it! It’s hard, and you used to be interesting .... Well, sorry. I have long since joined the dark side. And today we will highlight the plight, and beautifully growing southern communities, for overwhelmed parents.

MOM SAFETY NET

Jaycina Almond, founder of the Tender Foundation in East Point. In her first year of motherhood, she saw women the same age but facing very different realities. (Hyosub Shin/AJC)

Jaycina Almond founded a nonprofit rooted in a simple belief: Parents know what their families need.

This understanding comes from lived experience. Newly pregnant and just 20 years old, she found herself staring at impossible financial math until good fortune intervened. As the daughter of a single mother in Lexington, Kentucky, she’d witnessed the other end: an abusive relationship that led to financial entrapment.

Now years later, her Tender Foundation is one of Atlanta’s most reliable safety nets for single moms living on the margins.

• A recent study by Kindred Futures found a person born into poverty in Atlanta has a 4% chance of escaping it in their lifetime.
• Since 2020, Tender has raised more than $1.1 million. The organization has served more than 2,000 families and distributed more than 3,600 diapers and baby wipes.

Tender runs three programs based on the premise that families know best how to make their money work.

1. The Bridge is Tender’s long-term investment — 25 Black single mothers receive $500 a month for a full year, no strings attached. Bridge families have purchased cars, invested in their own businesses and hired neighbors.
2. The Dignity Fund delivers a one-time, no-strings cash transfer of $500 to 10 families a month, selected by lottery.
3. The Diaper Bank keeps running year-round. Its supplies reach families across metro Atlanta through a network of volunteer drivers who make drops each weekend.

Almond says her next goal is a mobile diaper pantry truck.

🔍 READ MORE: Jaycina Almond is redefining what support looks like for Atlanta mothers

MORE PARENTAL ADVICE

📞 Meet Moms on Call, which has been offering babycare and toddler advice for more than 20 years. The company just launched a new app to help log feedings and naps, plus it can connect you with a community forum, consultant or pediatric nurse. From Atlanta Magazine: Atlanta’s baby whisperers are out with a new app

📖 It’s OK to get a little creative with your down time. Mom friends Meredith Lavender and Kendall Shores did: co-writing a murder mystery. Details from the AJC on “Perfect Life”

🧴 Spray sunscreen is convenient, but cream or lotion-based options are really the safer bets. A few sunscreen mistakes Atlanta dermatologists want you to stop making

MARATHON MAH-JONGGERS

Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

You might think you love mah-jongg. But would you play for 24 hours straight? Well, how about doubling that.

• A quartet of mah-jongg community leaders travelled to Summerville, South Carolina from around the South for a marathon ‘jonging to set a Guinness World Record.
• They played for 48 hours straight inside a pickleball complex in Summerville, topping the 14-year-old record of 33 hours and 3 minutes.
• The punch-drunk players were fueled in part by Mountain Drew, Skittles, and peanuts. They were allowed a five-minute break after each hour of uninterrupted play.
• “We did this ... for really one reason: It was the joy and the love we have for this game and the community — and elevating this game to a grander scale," De Zutter told the Post and Courier.

🀄 Read more: How 4 women broke a world record inside Summerville pickleball venue

SIPS FROM AROUND THE SOUTH

🐬 Bluffton, S.C.: If you needed a good reason to stop in South Carolina’s low country, here’s one: bottlenose dolphins strand feeding. The rare spectacle involves a handful of dolphins launching themselves in unison onto a muddy bank to catch their pray on the shoreline. More (including video) from The Island Packet

🪦 Lewisburg, Tenn.: Strolling through old gravesites can be a lovely experience, but Sunset Park is Tennessee’s first cemetery to implement digital mapping that helps people more easily find specific plots. The software can also help trace family trees. More from Marshall County Tribune

🎺 Jackson, Miss.: Cool story about Mississippi Alumni All-Star Band that’s filling a void in arts education to train the Magnolia State’s next generation of musicians. More from Mississippi Today