Blog — Debbie Barrett-Jones

Hey Lovely Friends! I hope you are all doing well this morning. It is my last week of the semester. YAY!! Last week I had my last class of Graduate Seminar where I gave a presentation on my Final Paper that is due this Friday. I am not the…

Last workday for my Intro to Weaving Students...

Hey, good evening friends! Oh my goodness, I am going, to be honest with you right now. These last few weeks of this semester have been the hardest it has been in the past two years of going to school. I feel so many of us are exhausted and burned out. But I must say, I am so incredibly proud of my students, they have shown up and have done the work. Today was the last work for my Intro to Weaving Students before their Final Critique, this Wednesday. Next Wednesday will be my Advanced Weaving student's Final Critique. These images are from today in class. I am so excited to see their three final projects and will share images with you in my next post…

Hey Friends!

I hope you are all doing well and enjoying the spring weather. It is a beautiful Monday afternoon here in Lawrence. I decided to take a break in between teaching and my seminar class eat a little dinner and give you an update at Panera in Lawrence. It has been such a busy/full last two weeks.

I apologize for not giving you an update last week. I had lots of issues uploading images to my computer last week. As you can see from all my photos in this post, it has been a busy and productive time for me in the studio and for my students. I have been able to finish a larger barn piece made with tall grass and many small new pieces. And I am so proud and excited about my students' final projects. I have mentioned this before, but they have three final projects that are working on, a frame loom, paper weaving, and floor loom project, and will all work together in some way. Their final critique is Wednesday, May 4th. My advanced weaving students will have their four final floor loom projects critiqued on Wednesday, May 11th.

Hey Lovely Friends!!

Well, here we are, another week finished and a new one about to start. Last week I was able to finish some larger weavings, three on my big loom at home, that I will be hand-dyeing sometime after the semester ends. I wove an all-white scarf on my little loom at home and then this weekend I wove a few samples focusing on my grandma's farm. I really, really love how they turned out and it was so nice to work small again. It reminded me how much I want to continue to make these smaller pieces.

Hey Lovely Friends!

I hope you are all doing well and had a great weekend. Today is my birthday and it turned out to be pretty wonderful. I slept in a little, worked on some weaving, went out for breakfast with my family, got coffee from my favorite place, and went to the beautiful Kauffman Gardens and the Nelson Atkins Museum. After getting home I finished weaving on my loom, played 4-square with my family outside, and had a delicious dinner and ice cream cake. I am typing this post while relaxing on my couch and watching Somebody Somewhere. YAY!!

Hey All,

Well, Spring Break came and went and I made it through another full week of school, teaching, and working!! YAY!! During the break, I was able to get some rest along with getting one of my pieces photographed for the KCI Commission and getting my taxes done. I told myself if I just get those two big things done, it will be a good break. I got those done along with putting more yarn on my loom to weave soon and... I managed to get sick AGAIN! Thankful I am feeling better now, still not 100% but better.

Hey Lovely Friends!

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend. It's the beginning of spring break for me (YAY!) and thankfully for my school-aged kids and my husband who teaches (YAY!!). Last week I had my first and only large group critique for my seminar class. I am currently trying to figure out if I should use an older piece or a new piece that was woven, deconstructed, and reconstructed, to be photographed for the prints I will be installing for the KCI airport. I brought in an older piece to talk about. In the end, it was extremely helpful to see both pieces next to each other to figure things out. Thankfully I have come to a decision that I am almost 100% sure I will go with the originally older piece. Those that were in my critique agreed with me on Wednesday night. So, as of right now, I am moving forward in getting that piece photographed tomorrow, with two angle shots from the "woven" side and two angle shots from the "unwoven" side.

Hey Lovely Friends!!

Sorry, it has been longer than I wanted, but I have to tell you... these days have been kind of kicking my butt with how busy everything is and my energy level is pretty low. But that said, I am so happy that I am here, sitting in my cozy chair with my feet up, taking time to reflect on that last two weeks with you. Last night was First Friday Opening at Leedy-Voulkos Art Center. I worked on both Thursday and Friday all day. I have to tell you that I am so soooo excited about the shows we have there right now. We have a KCAI Student Show called In-Between by the AAPI Association. Here is a link to their work and in the Front and Main Gallery, we have Art of the Wish by Andy Newcom & Marn Jensen. They interviewed 200 elderly people from around the county asking them what their wishes would be for their family, friends, and the world and created an art piece based on their wishes. It is such a beautiful, heartfelt show.

Hey lovely friends! I hope you all had a wonderful weekend. Time is a strange beast right now. It was 60-degree weather on Wednesday and then we had 10" of snow in West Shawnee on Thursday and today back to 60 degrees. With the change of weather comes headaches for me. I have been dealing with more than usual right now... ugh. Oh...midwest winters. This past week of teaching I worked my butt off trying to get all my intro to weaving students on their looms, setting their patterns, and most were able to start weaving by the end of class on Wednesday. YAY!! We all will be working hard tomorrow to move forward in their assigned weaving samples. Looking forward to seeing what the students come up with. :)

Hey Friends!

I hope you are all doing well today. I am so relieved it is Friday afternoon and I am at home with my feet propped up. This week turned out to be extremely hard and really whipped me out. But here we all are, at the end of the week, heading into a new weekend. YAY!! I am so thankful despite having a tougher week, I was able to do some deconstructing on a new black and white piece to be able to hem sleeves on both ends. Then on Tuesday, I installed the large piece in my studio. This is the first time I will be able to deconstruct a piece with a lot of room. I will be able to walk around the piece while I pull threads and view it from all around the piece. I am excited about it. Next week I will get going on it.

Hey Lovely Friends!

I hope you are all doing well and staying healthy these days. I don't know about you but I am getting a little lost in my days, losing track of the days of the week especially when my daughters have had two snow days in a row, and before that our family all got sick. Thankfully we are all much better but here I am on this Thursday morning writing this post that I try to get done on Tuesday or Wednesday. :)

Despite slowing down some due to not feeling well, I feel like I have gotten a lot done the past week. Most of my hours during the day have been spent at my dining room table deconstructing one of my newest pieces. It doesn't take up too much energy but can be extremely tedious. I have tried to listen to some of my seminar readings while I am working. I am really excited about my progress. I absolutely love the transformation a piece like this goes through. I will continue to take photos of the progress and share them with you in my future posts.

Hey Lovely Friends!

I hope you are all doing well this Wednesday morning. Today marks one whole week of officially going back to school this spring semester. Right now I am sitting in my extremely cozy chair reflecting on the past week before I start teaching at 11:30 today. And tonight I will have my first studio visit in seminar class. Today will be a long day.

Last week in class I gave my students each a Healing with Weaving Frame Loom Kit to make their first sample weaving on. I thought this was a good exercise to pick out the yarns for them, so they didn't have to worry about that part. On Monday I had all of the students put up their weavings and talk a little about it along with catching up, asking each other questions to get to know each other. Next up I started them on their second assignment called Woven Together using blues and greens in their weavings that will be connected after they are finished to make a landscape. I will update you on this project later. YAY!!

Hey lovely friends,

I hope you are all doing well and staying healthy these days. Well, it is the night before I start teaching classes for this new Spring 2022 semester. For the most part, I think I am prepared. I spent many hours today rearranging the weaving room to get ready for 11 students, the most I have had so far. Eight of them will be weaving for the first time. I am trying something different this semester. I made sure we had a workstation with tables space and chairs for when I will have them work on their portable looms. I am thinking for the first half of the semester, Mondays I will have them weave on their frame looms and teach them paper weaving and on Wednesdays, they will work on floor loom weaving. I really wanted them to have time to build community, talk, and weave and be able to weave portable if anyone gets sick and needs to work from home.

Hey Lovely Friends! I hope you are doing well so far in this new year. I was so thankful for a beautiful past few days in Kansas City to enjoy some outdoor time. I don't know about you, but for my mental health, I have definitely needed to go outside and enjoy the sunshine.

I am heading to KU tomorrow morning for my first meeting to start the Spring Semester. To be honest, I really need more time off... but what can I do? :) I know in the end it will be good to see fellow graduate students and the facility. I am sure there is a lot of cleaning and organizing to do tomorrow. So please, wish me good luck.

Happy New Year Everyone!! I hope you are all doing well and staying healthy. This past few weeks I have managed to take time to lay on the couch and watch some movies along with getting ready for an extremely busy semester. I will be taking 15 credits of classes, teaching Intro to Weaving, working at Leedy-Voulkos Art Center (of course), and working on my commission for the new KCI Airport. I would also really like to teach a few Healing with Weaving Frame Loom Workshops as well...

I have been able to weave off a very large black and white piece that I will be deconstructing sometime this semester. I needed to finish weaving it to start working on a new pattern that I will be weaving the commission with. Thankfully I found the energy to get all 1620 threads through my reed to start working on threading a wave pattern. YAY!! This morning I was able to get halfway done. I am hoping to be weaving this first all-white piece soon to test out my pattern by the end of the week. I am really trying to get things moving along this week since I have so much other work to do next week to plan for teaching. My first class will be on Wednesday, January 19th.

Merry Christmas Eve, friends!! I hope you are all healthy and are doing as well as can be during this holiday season. I will make this post short since I have lots of baking and wrapping to do today. This morning I woke up at 5 am (yes, that is pretty typical) and wrote down my goals for today. Lately, I have been extremely unmotivated and exhausted. But there was something about this morning that I had just the energy to get moving. One of my biggest goals was to get both of my looms ready to start weaving. I have another black and white warp that has been a super pain to set and a blue and green one that is on my smaller loom. Thankfully I finished both of them and they are both ready to start weaving on. YAY!! Next on my list was to clean up my studio and thanks to having a cheesy Christmas movie playing in the background, I was able to get my studio all cleaned up. YAY!! This week I put up two calendars in my studio. One calendar takes up a large section of the wall for 18 months, January 2021-June 2023. I want to use this 18-month calendar to help plan out my KCI Airport Commission and MFA Thesis Exhibition, Lineages that I will be doing with my sister Kristine Barrett. YAY!! The other six-month calendar will help me plan out my schedule for teaching Intro to Weaving this coming spring semester. I have used this calendar system before which was extremely helpful in planning out the assigned weaving projects.

Hey Lovely friends and supporters! Well, I can finally say the semester to complete... well almost. I still need to put in grades for my students but that is it. YAY!! I am so relieved and believe it or not, exhausted. But my relief is giving me strength and gratitude for so much right now. I am so thankful I had the opportunity to teach weaving to college students for the second semester. They have been so much right now, going to college during a pandemic. But they overcame a lot in my class by showing up and weaving away. They inspired me and have taught me more about weaving. I didn't think it was possible to love weaving anymore, but teaching it and seeing others enjoy the benefits of weaving and make woven work, has increased my love for the art and craft.

Hey Lovely Friends! I hope you are all doing well this Friday in December. I am sitting here in front of my computer feeling a sense of relief that I have one more week left until the semester is officially over. Last weekend I had my Holiday Trunk Show at Leedy. YAY!! For those of you who wanted to come out but could not, no worries at all. I have all my scarves on sale now online until December 15th with Free Shipping. Please pass the word on. :)

Last week I taught my weaving students to hand-dye one of their woven projects. I am so excited about how they turned out. Next Wednesday will be their final critique and last class. I will make sure to post all their newest projects next week. My last class for the seminar was on Wednesday night. We had to do a final presentation on a proposal. I am still feeling so exhausted from it all. My seminar written final is due by next Friday. I am going to try hard to be finished with everything by Wednesday afternoon and then take a very long nap.

Hey, Lovely Patreon Supporters (and Friends)! I am excited to invite you to my graduate studio at the University of Kansas in Lawerence before I start up a new semester in January. You have been so kind to support me while I am on this journey going back to school and I would love to have you come and see where I have been working from along with giving you a tour of the Textile Depart including my favorite room, the Weaving Room.

Hey Lovely Friends! Well, I passed my second-year review!! YAY!!! I am so relieved and thankful. Last week was extremely full. I had a studio visit for my seminar class on Wednesday night and then Friday morning I had my second-year review. I, fortunately, was able to have the review in my studio which was extremely unusual. I work all day on Thursday at LVAC and then I would have had to drive to KU afterward to start setting up that night for review the next morning. Because of my little time (and energy to be honest), the committee allowed me to have a meeting in my studio. So Friday morning I arrived at 8:45 am and cleared out my two weaving looms and work table to make room for the six facility members that were a part of the review.

Hey Lovely Friends! Hope you are all doing well this Wednesday evening. I am just about 30 minutes away from having a studio visit for my seminar tonight and wanted to share real quick share with you what I have been up to at KU. For about a month I have been weaving new scarves to overdye and on Sunday I was able to take time in the dye studio to go for it. It's actually been almost a year since I have dyed anything and many years since I have dyed scarves, so it was soooo nice to work with such beautiful colors inspired by the autumn right now. I loved how they turned out and next up I will photograph all of them. I will make sure to share my studio images with you and some images of the newest scarves in my next post.

Hey lovely people! I hope this week is going well for you right now. I don't know about you but man... I am really tired this week. Probably has to do something with daylight savings time...

This past week I have been busy making more woven scarves that I am going to over-dye hopefully this weekend. I am planning to have these scarves available to purchase at my Holiday Trunk Show I am having at the beginning of next month. Details from my FB Event are down below. I have also been working on my sample work at my smaller loom that I am really excited about. All of these pieces will go up in my studio for an upcoming Studio Visit next Wednesday night for seminar class and they will go up for my Second Year Review on the 19th of this month. Because I can be so busy and get stressed out I have purposely made sure I get myself outside to help fill my cup. ;)

Morning friends!! I hope you are all doing well today. Happy November 2nd!! This past weekend I went to KU to take down my work both in the Graduate Cases and the Gallery. The work in the cases was up for two weeks for people to view. The gallery is locked up and only open for our critiques this semester. As for as the cases go, I went with work that was smaller, my smaller studies. Like most of you know that until graduate school I didn't make smaller work, the smallest I went was my woven scarves. As I move forward as an artist and my time left at KU I will be making bigger work for my thesis but will continue to make smaller work as well. I plan to have some of them in my thesis exhibition.

Hey, good morning everyone!! I hope you are doing well on this fall day. I still cannot believe how quickly this semester is going. I am in the 10th week of this fall semester. Last Wednesday I had my first in-person critique since last year was mostly virtual. A week later I am still processing everything that happened that night. I had my black and white pieces critiqued first and then did my first solo performance that turned out to be extremely vulnerable and then had the performance critiqued. Overall I am really happy and satisfied with the way things went but that said... it was extremely draining. I learned so much about performance and helped me with ideas for the future. After I pulled weft threads out of my piece as one of my sister's songs was playing I gave the viewers a chance to pull threads. These threads represented for me, things/thoughts/memories of the past that have brought pain/grief/bitterness and as I am pulling each piece out, I am acknowledging these memories and working to be free of the pain they have brought me. I am working through becoming a freer person that is learning to forgive. There is still more to this piece that is too personal that someday I might be able to open up about..

Hey lovely friends! I hope you are having a wonderful start to the week. Last week I took some time at the sewing machine, something I have not done for....more than fifteen years. My weaving students' first project was to each set a loom with a different pattern and weave two 9" samples on each loom. I took all the weaving samples to the sewing machine to sew a quick stitch line so I can cut up each sample. Eventually, each of their samples will go into their weaving portfolio binder. Aren't their samples awesome!! I absolutely love seeing them on the wall altogether and will be sad to take them down.

Revisiting work from last year...

Hey lovely friends! I hope you are doing well on this October Sunday. I am thankful to have a Fall Break on Monday and Tuesday. So, hopefully, I will have time to catch up a little on work and rest. Probably need to put rest before work...

This week my new metal prints arrived from Germany and I love them!! I only took a photo of one of them but I will be having a critique next Wednesday that I will have all three in. I will make sure to take photos and share them with you. :)

Hey lovely friends! I hope you are all doing well and have enjoyed your first of October weekend. I am feeling much better than last week, still coughing some, but much better. I was able to finish my first of many landscape yarn installation pieces. I am planning to have it up and installed for my first of the semester critique on Wednesday, October 13th. I will install it and possibly pull the weft threads out of it as a part of the performance. I will think more about it and let you know the details soon. I am weaving scarves right now to overdye sometime this month. They are woven with white tencel for the warp and different colors of bamboo yarn for the weft. I am probably going to dye them in gradations of autumn colors. YAY!!

Hey lovely friends and supporters! I hope you are doing well this Sunday evening. I have been dealing with being sick with some kind of virus cold thingy. UGH!! I have felt the sickest I have felt for years. I took a Covid test last Tuesday and it came back negative, thankfully. I am still feeling pretty exhausted and still dealing with a cough. I decided to take another test this afternoon. And I am taking tomorrow to rest instead of teaching at taking my class. Hopefully, I will feel better soon.

Hey lovely friends! How are you? I really hope you are all doing as well as can be right now. I am so thankful that it's Sunday afternoon, I woke up early to work on Healing with Weaving Frame Loom Kits and afterward went on a long bike ride with my husband. Of course, I am now extremely tired and need a nap. :) This week I was able to find the energy to get quite a few things done. I finished pulling threads from my large black and white piece. I will probably make another one that will be a part of a large installation for my first critique on Wednesday, October 13th. My weaving students are doing awesome, weaving away. I will make sure to share photos next week of what they are working on. On Wednesday, I was winding a new warp on the warping board and my Apple watch wanted to record a swimming workout. I thought that was funny and wanted to share it with you.

Hey Lovely Friends! It has been quite an exciting( and busy) week!! Last Friday right before I headed down to Leedy-Voulkos Art Center to prepare for the First Friday Opening, I was a part of a Municipal Art Commission zoom meeting and found out I was one of 19 artists chosen to create custom artwork for the new Kansas City Airport. YAY!!

Hey all!! Oh my goodness, it's Wednesday and I just finished teaching my fourth class of weaving this afternoon. I have to admit... I am exhausted right now. But I plan to eat something soon, so I am sure that will help. ;)

I finished weaving apiece on my big loom a few weeks ago and I was able to start deconstructing it yesterday. I couldn't help myself from taking some process images that quickly led to making some designs from it. YAY!! These might be my favorite designs so far. I will figure out if I want to have some prints made from them... What do you think?

Hey Lovely People! I hope you are all doing well this week. Oh my goodness!!! School has already started for me. I just started on Monday and just finished teaching my second class of weaving. I don't have lots of time to type how it went but overall it is going better than I thought. I decided to have my students help me with Healing with Weaving and I was COMPLETELY blown away by how good it was to have help!!! I am getting so much closer to having the 150 kits ready to donate. I will probably try to donate them next week...

Hey all!! I hope you are doing well on this Tuesday night. Hey all!! I hope you are doing well on this Tuesday night. I cannot believe how quickly the summer has flown by. I have less than a week until school starts on Monday the 23rd. I am so thankful that before it started I was able to get 50 Healing with Weaving Frame Loom Kits dropped off last Friday morning. I find it so hard to find the words to use to express how meaningful it was to get them in the hands of staff, patients, and family members. I am still needing to get 150 more to drop off sometime in the next month. I am planning to have my weaving students help me with putting together the kits the first week of school. I thought it would be nice for them to have an opportunity to slow down and talk about their summer along with helping with something meaningful. :)

Hey lovely people! I hope you are all doing well, on this Tuesday night. I am still working hard on getting the Healing with Weaving Loom Kits ready to be dropped off on Friday. YAY!! I will be dropping off 50 of them now and the rest later after I get some help from my students.

Hey all!! First of all, I apologize for not posting for a week. I had the opportunity to visit my sisters in California with my husband and deal with the post-vacation fog and a little depression with missing my sisters + family so much!!

Brandon and I had such an amazing time. I will probably add more images of my time there later this week but I wanted to make sure to add the images of my sister, Kristine, who lives in Sausalito on a houseboat. I was there not just to spend time with her and her husband but also to help her thread her new loom. Isn't her studio beautiful? She was the best student and of course, she LOVES weaving!!! YAY!!!

Hey Lovely Friends!!

I hope you are all doing well this week. I don't have a lot to post this week that is much different from last week. I am still working on my Healing with Weaving Frame Loom Weaving Instructions and video instructions. I am planning to make two videos. I have one done so far and will be working on the second next up which will be a simpler version for those at Children's Mercy that receive a kit. Making the videos turns out to be a lot harder than I thought... But I am getting closer.

Good Monday morning to you all! I hope you had a wonderful weekend. I will make this post somewhat quick because I am trying to spend time off my computer and devices this week. But I wanted to let you know that last Friday was a day to celebrate. We made it to our 200th Healing with Weaving Frame Looms made and warped. YAY!! Thankfully I had help from one of my Intro to Weaving students, Abby and three other graduate students, Tiana, Jenny and Dora. I am so thankful for them and for all those that have been cheering for us along the way.

Hey All!! I hope you had a wonderful holiday weekend. I am shocked about how fast this summer is going. Last week I spent 8-hour days, Monday-Wednesday making looms at KU and while I was working at Leedy-Voulkos Art Center on Thursday and Friday, I thankfully had help from Tiana, Jenny, and Dora, other graduate students.

Hey Everyone! I hope you are all doing well this Monday afternoon at the end of June. I have been busy making the Healing with Weaving Frame Looms at KU since last Monday. It's been a slow process but I am thrilled to say that by 4:30 today, I should have 100 looms made. Halfway there!! I am so thankful to have a few other graduate students and one of my weaving students help me out as well.

Hey Everyone! I hope you are all doing well today! Last week I had such a wonderful time with my sister, Kristine, staying with us and while she was at our home I taught her to weave from my little loom. YAY!! Not a surprise, she did an amazing job and she loved it. She loved it so much that on Wednesday, we went to the Yarn Barn in Lawrance, KS and she ordered a loom and accessories to be shipped off to her home in Sausalito, CA. It was extremely hard to say goodbye to her yesterday. I love my sisters so much!! I guess I will just have to take a trip out to CA to visit both Cyndy and Kristine soon. :)

Hey Everyone!! So sorry I haven't posted for two weeks. A week ago today, I was heading up to Minnesota with my daughters, sister Kristine, and my parents to visit the farm where my grandma was born and raised on. Where we stayed had very slow internet so it actually forced me to take a break from getting on my computer posting anything. I really needed the break because I week before we left was not only my typical First Friday installation week at Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, where I work, but I was also helping install a group exhibition I was a part of, the KU Graduate Arts Association. We had our opening on Thursday, June 3 and the next night was the First Friday Opening. Then on Saturday, I had an interview scheduled by KCUR in my home studio. (I will let you know more about that soon.)

Hey All!! Happy Memorial Day!! I hope you are all doing well and getting some extra rest and joy during this holiday weekend. I am excited to let you know that last week I made my first Healing with Weaving Frame Loom at KU. YAY!! Unfortunately, it has turned out to be a super slow process... It turns out to take 21 minutes and 33 seconds to laser cut one loom. So, I am currently trying to figure out a faster option... I will keep you posted. :)

Hey All!! I hope you are all doing well this evening!! I am so excited to let you know that my June Textile Sale for Healing with Weaving Starts Now for you as my lovely Patreon Supporters. But of course, like I mentioned last week, there is no pressure at all for you to purchase anything. I am just so grateful for your support that I am using half to fund making the Healing with Weaving Looms. If you are interested in taking a look at all my work that is available to purchase with up to a 50% Off Discount through the end of June, here are your links for you to view.

Hey Everyone! Oh, my goodness, I hope you are all doing well this Sunday evening. I am thankful to have a weekend to get a little extra sleep. I am still extremely tired from such a busy year and last few weeks but extremely thankful at the same time. I am working on putting together a fundraising event for Healing with Weaving this June. Basically, I will be having a textiles sale on all my scarves and artwork and proceeds from my sale will go towards making as many frame looms as possible to donate to local Kansas City hospitals, medical and counseling facilities and provide community weaving workshops after this summers pilot project for Children's Mercy.

Hey Everyone! I hope you are doing well this morning. I am pretty excited about waking up this Monday morning. I made it to the last week of my first year of grad school!!! I am so happy, relieved, thankful, and proud. YAY!!. I am tired and blurry-eyed from just waking up while typing this but sooooo happy I am. I have learned more than I ever expected in these last 9 months about myself personally, artistically, and professionally. I want to thank each of you for your support along the way!! I am so honored and thankful to have it!!

Hey, there! Happy Sunday morning to you all!! I hope you are doing well this weekend. I wanted to share with you some EXCITING news. I am so honored and thrilled to have received the ArtsKC Inspiration Grant to help fund my first Healing with Weaving Community Outreach Program for Children’s Mercy Hospital.

Here is my grant description that is found online

***ARTS KC INSPIRATION GRANT***

Hey all!! I hope you are all doing well and had a fantastic week. I had my first and only critique with my students last Wednesday. I decided at the beginning of the semester that I wanted to have only one critique that each student would get feedback on all three of their final projects, one from each unit. It was so wonderful seeing all three, their final Frame Loom Weaving, Paper Weaving, and their Floor Loom Weaving all next to each other. They have done such an incredible job this semester and I am so proud of them I only have one photo right now. I want to ask their permission to share their work here and once I get it, I will make sure to add it to my post..

So this week was extremely busy. I not only had my final critique for the year in my seminar class, but I had my First Year Review yesterday morning. I am currently sitting at my work table from my studio at KU with feelings of relief, exhaustion, and gratitude for getting through it all. And... oh, yeah, I passed my FYR, YAY!

Hey Everyone! I hope you are all doing well and have been able to enjoy some time outside. I am sending you this post-hours after we arrived back home from a weekend away to Bentonville, Arkansas. It was my birthday last Saturday and with First Friday before and Easter after, we planned more than a month before to get away for a weekend. It has been more than 20 months since we left the KC area. My husband and I are fully vaccinated and we felt safer traveling.

First of all, HAPPY EASTER Everyone!! I really hope you all had a wonderful weekend. It was gorgeous over the weekend, so I was able to enjoy the sunshine and see family yesterday. I am off to KU in a few hours to teach but I wanted to share with you what I worked on last week. I was encouraged by one of my professors to just get on my loom and weave. So that is what I did on Wednesday. I didn't have much of a plan, all I knew was I had some leftover warp of the purple and white. It had been a few weeks since I last was at my loom and the moment I started, I realized how much I needed it.

Hey Good morning, friends! I hope you are all well this Sunday morning. This week, started off with my car breaking down at Lawrence, KS right after teaching but thankfully was able to get fixed the next day. After that excitement, I spent lots of energy on writing and putting together a grant submission to help fund the Healing with Weaving Community Outreach Program. For my pilot project, scheduled for this summer, I plan to have frame loom kits available to be used at Children's Mercy Hospital...

Good Sunday morning to you all! Last week I had my first critique of the semester in my seminar class. I decided to put together an interactive piece for students and classmates to participate in. Last Sunday I asked Emma to be the first to follow the steps in this piece. Basically, I asked the viewer to take time to slow down, close their eyes and focus on their breathing. Once they do that, think about something that they have been struggling with causing stress or pain in their lives. Once they take time thinking about that, when they are ready, pick a purple thread that represents that and pull it from the woven piece.

Hey, Good Sunday morning to you all! I hope you are doing as well as can be this weekend. This past week was full once again with reading, writing, weaving on my loom, pulling threads, weaving with paper, and teaching at KU. I am getting more and more comfortable with teaching my weaving class. I have half of my students virtual, finishing up their paper weaving unit this week, and half in-person learning to set up their floor looms. Soon all my students will be on looms…

Hey all!

This past week went by so fast. And here we are, it's Sunday morning and I am starting a new week at KU. It will be my second-week teaching in-person starting Monday. Last weekend, Cora came with me to KU and helped pull some of my threads in the piece pictured with her. I had to take down my work by Saturday in the Graduate Cases. After taking them down, Cora helped me in the weaving room. She helped document the beginning steps so I could put together a tutorial video for my students that would start on Monday.

Hey all!

I hope you are all doing as well as can be right now. I am amazed at how quickly this month has gone by. Week #4 of my Spring Semester is almost complete. This week was full of pulling threads from a few of my pieces (I will post a video soon), paper weaving, weaving at my loom and teacher/parent conferences, and celebrating my 5th grader's 11th birthday. I am extremely tired and grateful at the same time. We were able to have a wonderful outing yesterday with one of her friends and Emma seemed to be really happy…

First Studio Visit for the semester at KU...

Good Friday morning to you all! I hope you are all safe and healthy today. I am sitting in my living room in front of my fireplace and thankful for a warm house right now. Whenever I sit down to create a post and forces me to take time to slow down and reflect on the past week. This week was a big one for me since I had my (virtual) first studio visit for the semester. We were supposed to let our cohort know what we were up to over break and currently. I uploaded lots of images to my computer for that presentation and I thought I would share those with you. I included captions on most of the images…

Weaving Memory...

Posted on FEB 12, 2021 AT 6:44 AM

Hey everyone,

I really hope you are all doing well today. This week has been such a busy/full week but thankfully I have had time to slow down and create. Last Friday before I headed to work a the art center I stopped by one of my favorite places in Kansas City, the Kauffman Memorial Gardens…

Weaving Memory

A Healing Craft Activity for Mourners

Weaving memory can be one way to deal with grief and loss. In this video Rabbi Janet Madden teaches us a technique for weaving memories together, using simple supplies. This craft activity can give you the time and space to remember your loved one and knit together your feelings again.

This video is taught in the Jewish tradition but of course, it’s a wonderful craft for anyone.

And So It Begins...

Posted on FEB 4, 2021 AT 7:47 AM

Well, my second semester at KU has officially begun. I started on Monday with classes and my first day of teaching. It's now Thursday and I am thankful that I made it through so far but still extremely tired and yes...

Still here... just planning away...

Posted on JAN 27, 2021 AT 7:43 AM

Hey Everyone,

It is Wednesday morning. I have been up since 4:45 am. I am pretty tired, my shoulders and neck hurt and I have a really bad headache. All that said I am doing pretty well. I have been busy getting ready to teach my Intro to Weaving class at KU that starts on Monday…

Posted at JAN 17, 2021 AT 7:46 AM

It's not just a scarf... look closer

Sunday morning to you all! I hope you have been doing well and getting lots of rest this weekend. I myself have actually been going to bed earlier these days and sleeping in a little.

Posted at JAN 8, 2021 AT 9:48 AM

Cleaning the Weaving Room and Designing...

Hey Everyone!! Thanks so much to those that were able to join my Live Weaving on FB session on Saturday and no worries at all if you couldn't make it.

Posted at Jan 1, 2021 at 10:37 AM

Weaving LIVE on Facebook today...

Happy New Year, everyone!! I just wanted to let you know real quick th…

Posted on DEC 30, 2020 AT 9:27 AM

Thank you for all your support during my first semester at KU…

Hey Everyone! I hope you are all doing well, as well as you can during these times, and had a wonderful holiday, as well as it could be during these times. I want to first of all thank you so much for your support so far during my first semester of grad school at KU. As a thank you, I put together a little thank you package for each of you…