Smyrna Voices

Local Parents Share Their Favorite Family Recipes

Family recipes are more than just instructions for preparing a meal; they are a reflection of a family’s heritage, traditions, and love for one another. Local parents have opened up their recipe books to share some of their favorite family...

{International Babywearing Week} The Best Soft Structured Carriers

Since it’s once again International Babywearing Week, we wanted to bring this topic back around again. Last year I shared my “Adventures in Babywearing” story. So if you’ve read that, or done any research on the benefits of babywearing, then you’re...

10 Life Lessons from Children’s Books

Sometimes you just need some inspirational reminders to cheer you up and put things in perspective. And what better way, especially on Dr. Seuss’s Birthday, than to go back to the tales of your childhood when things were a little simpler (tree...

The importance of creative moment and arts in young children

We’ve all heard it before…”the arts are important for children”…but why? Research has found that active music making can lead to increased language development, math skills, good grades, better-adjusted school behavior and...

Adventures in Babywearing

Before I actually had a baby, I knew I wanted to babywear. (Side note: I don’t necessarily love the term “babywear”, but since that’s what it’s generally called these days, that’s the term I’ll be using). I had a few friends that babywore,...

{Smyrna Voices} Football Memories + Giveaway!

College football kicked off this Saturday and, like many of you, it’s hard to describe my excitement. This is perhaps unusual since my immediate family wasn’t a sports family and I went to a college that was smaller than a single...

Never say never?

Sometimes thinking ahead and discussing what you “always” or “never” do can save some heartache later There have been a lot of hard headlines in the news lately; from children being left in cars to young adults not wearing their seatbelts and...

A Tinysaurus 1st Birthday

The last few months of my son’s first year were bittersweet; each day he discovered something new and did something exciting, but each of those days he was also starting look less like a baby and more like a little boy. At...

{Smyrna Voices} For the Dads

There are certain qualities in a father that mean the most to me. First, I think a father should provide unconditional love. A father should encourage their child to be a critical and independent thinker. A father should inspire their child to be a...

Creative Parenting: In Praise of the Cautionary Tale

Hi everyone! As most of you probably know by now, I am the proud mother to an amazing 15 year old daughter. Fifteen years has passed in the blink of an eye, and while each stage from infant to the teen years (which we are in the midst of now) has...