In July, I shared an update about Tyra Johnson, a single mom in St. Louis, whose story I have followed for the past two years.

At that moment in the summer, her life was falling apart. Someone had stolen her car, and she didn't have transportation to work or child care for her three young children. She also had a ticket for driving without a license.

That column sparked an outpouring of support from readers.

The first challenge was to help Johnson, 32, get her driver's license. She had always driven on a learner's permit. A reader connected her friends Simon Anderson and Sara Jay, who own Coach Harder Driving School, with Johnson's story and asked if they could help.

They immediately offered multiple driving lessons and also offered to accompany her to the test until she passed.

"Families without an easy form of transportation have many hardships that are unique to their situation -- especially for single-parent families with several children," Anderson said. "With three young kids ourselves, we can only imagine how difficult it is to raise them alone. We heard of Tyra and her hard times and were amazed by her positive attitude and optimism."

Their desire to help was cemented after meeting her in person, he said.

Johnson passed the driving test on her first attempt.

"I'm the first one of my mom's children to get a license," she said, crying tears of joy.

Anderson and his wife were among many who wanted to help. Another local do-gooder, Riz Khan, runs the Little Angels Foundation. After reading the story, he asked his members to donate to help buy Johnson another car. They responded enthusiastically. He also reached out to his friend, Zia M. Ahmad, who heads Muslim Community Services, St. Louis, and shared the story.

Ahmad was moved, and his members donated generously.

"Hearing about Tyra's plight and the difficulties she was facing in going about her daily responsibilities after her car was stolen, members of our group were moved to help her," Ahmad said. One of their members began searching for a safe and reliable used SUV, which was hard to find in the heated used-car market. When they finally found one, they purchased it, along with insurance and an anti-theft device.

When Johnson found out about the car, she cried again.

"I didn't know how I was going to make a way," she said. She had lost her job with Walmart because of child care and transportation issues. Another reader donated $600 in Uber gift cards, and they had quickly run out.

While these two local organizations quickly stepped up to replace her car, nearly a hundred readers wrote asking how they could contribute and help. Phil Sher, 78, a retired financial adviser, had connected with Johnson after I first wrote about her in August 2020. He set up a GoFundMe for her.

Donors contributed nearly $20,000 to that fund, which Sher manages for Johnson.

"It was beyond my expectations," Sher said. He's used the money to pay for a rental car during the month it took to find, purchase and transfer the title for a replacement car to her. It's also paid off a significant amount of her bills that had accumulated.

When Sher first got involved in helping Johnson, he said his goal was to help move her and her children out of the cycle of poverty and into the middle class.

He's hopeful about her attaining this goal eventually.

Johnson wants to use the remaining funds to either move to a safer apartment or as a down payment on a house. She has found a full-time job as a receptionist for a crisis hotline, signed up for a first-time homebuyers' program through Better Family Life St. Louis and is taking night classes to earn her high school diploma through MERS Goodwill. She is learning about budgeting and how to improve her credit score.

"I'm in a better place in life now," Johnson said.

Johnson said she has stayed in touch with Khan, who kicked off the campaign to replace her car. He and his volunteers spend every Saturday morning feeding the homeless downtown. She said she's looking forward to joining them soon.

"He helped me when I didn't have help," she said.

She hopes to pay it forward.

Debbi Musen, 75, was in New York City over the summer to help her daughter pack up her family's apartment. She was certainly not there to model in her pajamas.

But when her daughter, Melissa Gerstein, a producer originally from Creve Coeur, Missouri, saw an open call posted by a casting director on Instagram, she convinced Musen to take a break.

The agency was looking for real-life mother-daughter and sister pairs for a campaign for Soma Intimates, a lingerie, sleepwear and swimwear retailer. They were looking for women to feature in bras or pajamas.

Gerstein, 50, knew that she and her mom were definitely not interested in modeling in their undies, so she uploaded a few photos of the two of them -- fully clothed. To their surprise, they were invited to go audition in person.

"My mom was looking at me like I'm ridiculous," Gerstein said. Musen, a grandmother of five, had more practical concerns: She was concerned about finishing the packing. But she agreed to set aside the tape and bubble wrap for a short excursion.

They walked into a room filled with gorgeous women, some carrying professional headshots and resumes. Gerstein assured her mom they wouldn't be staying long; she only had an hour free before a scheduled work call. Five minutes before they had to head out, they were called in to audition.

"I didn't know what to expect," Musen said. They had never done anything like this before, so they decided to just be themselves.

"They asked us all these questions," Gerstein said, like what they loved about each other and enjoyed doing together during the holidays. The pair talked about their relationship and holiday traditions. When they walked out, they both agreed it had been a fun experience. Then they immediately forgot about it. Neither thought they had a chance of being picked.

"Not a hope in the world, as far as I was concerned," Musen said.

"For sure, we'll never hear from them," Gerstein thought.

Two weeks later, an email popped up in Gerstein's inbox.

"Congratulations, you've been cast," it said. They were going to be part of a nationwide campaign for Soma, with a print campaign hanging in 80 retail stores and on the company's social media accounts.

Gerstein called her mom with the news.

"No way! Don't joke with me," she said. Musen was convinced her daughter was kidding. When Gerstein read her the email, she was in shock.

"How do we have time to do this when we are moving your apartment?" she asked her daughter. She had planned to stay in New York for a couple of weeks to help with the move, but extended her stay to accommodate the photo shoot.

A day was set aside to pick out their wardrobe and do the fittings. The next day, hair and makeup artists got them ready for a full day of shooting with a photographer from London.

"It was very new for me," Musen said. Gerstein said she was delighted to see her mom get pampered.

"For the two of us to have this beautiful day and moment, it was really special. I will never forget it," Gerstein said.

When they saw the photos, they were blown away. Musen said the photographer made them look better than she could have imagined.

The pair said that the best part of the story is that they had decided to do it together on a whim. There's something to be said for being open to spontaneity even when facing daunting tasks like moving.

Musen said she's always been a somewhat serious person, so landing a modeling gig in her 70s was a bit outside her comfort zone. But she trusted that her daughter would make any adventure memorable.

"It was a really fun experience," Musen said.

She was also thrilled that they got to keep the pajamas.

A number of moms are fed up with that snooping, snitching elf.

The trouble started innocently enough in 2005 when Carol Aebersold and her daughter Chanda Bell self-published the book "The Elf on the Shelf: A Christmas Tradition." It included a box with a small elf inside. In the homes that let him in, the elf would report back to Santa every night and get into new scenes of mischief every day.

That box unleashed weeks of misery for overworked parents: Already stressed out during the holidays, they were now saddled with coming up with daily set decorations for the elf. Even just remembering to move him to a new location after the kids went to bed added another thing to a long to-do list.

Children swapped tales of elf antics on the playground. Enter Pinterest and Instagram to up the ante. The elves were courting a backlash.

How to reject the elf game has become a hot topic in parenting groups and chats. A recent post asked for advice on responding to a young child's questions about the elf, and the responses revealed parents' creativity and common sense. Highlights:

-- We didn't sign up for/subscribe to the elf service.

-- Santa is short-staffed (get it?), so there's a waitlist.

-- An elf watching our every move is creepy.

-- Those elves are for kids who need extra reminders to be good.

-- We told Santa "no thanks" because we can't deal with the messes.

-- Every family celebrates the holidays differently. This isn't one of our family traditions.

-- Our elf is invisible.

-- All family members, including pets, must agree that our house is safe for an elf. Our dog can't promise elf safety.

-- We don't need one. I have a direct line to Santa.

-- An elf didn't come with this house.

But the prize for ingenuity goes to Amy Kiefer, 34, a Missouri event planner and real estate agent with three young children. When her daughter was in kindergarten, she heard stories about the elf from classmates and asked her mom why they didn't have one.

Kiefer also had a 1-year-old and a 2-year-old at the time.

"I was not new to the concept. I knew I did not have the time or the attention to give an elf, to make it what her expectations would be," Kiefer said. She put off her daughter's questions with a noncommittal, "We'll see what happens."

She started searching online for alternatives. That's when she stumbled across the idea of a gnome: a mythical creature that could just hang around without requiring any additional work.

She found what she was looking for in the clearance bins at Target. She picked up one larger gnome and a three-pack of mini-gnomes. They showed up in the Kiefer home, along with a note explaining that "Gnomie and his homies" would camp out in the family's bedrooms, keep an eye out for Santa and bring holiday magic. The only rule was that they couldn't be touched or moved, or it would ruin their magic.

Brilliant move, Mom.

Kiefer didn't intend to start a new holiday tradition. She was just looking for a simpler way to give her child a fun experience.

"That fact is that there are so many expectations put on parents. It's not just Christmas -- it's birthday parties, it's the treats you bring to soccer practice. Everything is so built up," she said.

The glittering posts on social media have lost their luster for this younger generation of moms, Kiefer says. They are tired of the Era of Excess Parenting.

"All the moms in my generation are feeling constant anxiety about all the expectations and having to do all the things. So, we are starting to throw in the towel and realizing, 'I don't have to follow the mainstream. I can do what works for my family.'"

Kiefer's background as an event planner gives her a healthy perspective on those picture-perfect social media posts. She knows they are stylized and staged and not representative of reality.

Their laid-back gnomes have appeared for the past three years, and her daughter loves them.

"Anytime she tells anyone about her gnome, they think it's funny, too," she said.

The best part of Gnomie and his homies, for Kiefer?

They're cool and lazy and just sit there.