Whether this is your first time joining MacaroniKid Shelbyville IN or you have been with us since November, welcome to the #MacKidShelby community! We are excited to have you here and want to introduce you to your local publisher serving your community!
Name: Jenna Martin
Hometown: Brownsburg, IN
Current City: Shelbyville, IN
How Many Kids: 1 daughter and 2 fur babies (a weim and black lab)
What do you do for fun?: During the warmer weather you can find my family outside! Between the multiple parks, free splash pad, trails, and downtown events our house becomes simply a place to sleep. My family also LOVES food! Since we have moved to Shelbyville in 2021, we make it a point to try local restaurants all around the county. Our default location on a night we need a quick bite is Munchies because it is affordable, quick service, and SUPER kid friendly! Multiple chalkboards, cartoons, coloring menus, and a fried PB&J- a toddler's paradise!
What is one thing you wish others knew about Shelbyville/Shelby County?: I truly believe that Shelbyville is underrated when thinking about the greater-Indianapolis suburb area. It is a perfectly drivable distance for a weekend getaway to Indianapolis, Louisville, and Cincinatti, it is a short drive to any kind of shopping from the outlet mall to the growing retail in Greenwood and Franklin, and still provides the good small-town feel and country-living that people reminisce about when they sing, "My Indiana Home." I have traveled a lot over the past 11 years for work and since beginning our family roots in Shelby County I have been blown away by the way strangers and kin alike rally together for neighbors and create their own community events like the new Waldron Christmas Parade!
What is MacaroniKid and why bring it to Shelby County?
Anyone who knows me knows I love the feeling of community and being a part of the action. Growing up I was raised in a house that if you take from the community then you give to a community. For example, if you participate in a sport or event, then you give your time back by paying it forward with service, that could be coaching, setting up, tearing down, etc. After college, I took that philosophy with me and have been a "professional volunteer" for numerous organizations for over 11 years.
In 2019 my husband and I were blessed to have our first child only months later to experience an international lockdown and my husband deploying for a year-long military tour. To say I longed for connection and community was an understatement.
As the world began navigating a post-pandemic "norm", I, like many others, was ready to jump back into our community and prioritize being with family. For us, that meant considering a residence change. At this time, my husband and I found a new home here in Shelbyville, IN. Though I had never lived in Shelbyville before, my husband was a third-generation life of both his parents' families.
I grabbed the flyers at the library, searched all the local websites, signed up for numerous newsletters; and then thought of all the other parents doing the exact same thing- heck, there were (and still are) houses being built everywhere. I couldn't be alone. There had to be an easier way, and that is why I decided to bring Macaroni Kid to Shelbyville.
Macaroni Kid is the nation’s largest single publishing
platform answering the question:
“Mama, what are we doing today?”
for more than 3,000,000 families in
4,000+ communities across the country.
Each Macaroni Kid community is managed by a local publisher mom or dad, who publishes weekly, hyper-local e-newsletters and websites featuring events, activities, products and places for parents, kids and families. They host local events and parties and connect with their communities via social media. They enrich communities by connecting the libraries, schools, rec centers, community centers and all of the wonderful organizations and businesses that create programming and fun for kids and families with local families.
So if I was going to start my new journey in Shelby County,
why not create a valuable resource for community families
that has events, resources, and activities that comes right to their email?
Starting just this past fall 2021, my first months as a publisher have been spent finding events and entering them into the Macaroni Kid calendar; parks, libraries, special events. I couldn't believe how many family-focused events were truly happening in Shelby County! I started sharing on social media platforms and creating newsletters and was blown away with how many comments I received from long-time residents saying they wished they had a resource like this and were following for things to do with their grandkids!
It felt great to share this information with our subscribers! As the content grew, so did the subscribers. Parents deserve a break whenever they can get it, and that is what I have been able to provide - an incredibly easy way to find all the programs and events being planned just for us!
The next step in my Macaroni Kid journey is to connect local businesses and community resources to our subscribers. When I discover places my family and friends love, I am working to provide a low-cost, effective way for them to advertise to their target market - local parents. Additionally, sponsorships help me to create resource guides for new and expecting moms, families find free or cheap places to shop and experience, and support community events through targeted advertising. My Macaroni Kid business provides me with many avenues to work with local companies to fit their goals including site ads, barters, event partnerships, review articles, giveaways, and more.
The most rewarding part of my job though is connecting families and my community. What we do is more than a website and I realize this more and more as I hear things like “Thanks to your website we found a local sensory-sensitive class that my son who is autistic loves” and “We have been able to schedule family fun time even while our kids' schedules are crazy thanks to your calendar!”
