Click here to listen. © Jane Pollak 2025 (illustrated with pieces of my art process along the way) I’ll say it. I hate being a beginner. Which is kinda silly, because anytime I try something new, which I love to do, I’m in that role. I don’t like failing....
Click here to listen. © Jane Pollak 2025(illustrated with pieces of my art process along the way) Since my eldest child gave birth in 2011, I’ve kept an ongoing Notes section labeled Grandma Activities. Whenever newspaper articles or ads for family fun...
Click here to listen. I’m very suggestible. When a fiber arts colleague on Instagram shared her wisdom about material storage, I accepted and felt compelled to honor her methodology. “At what point do you throw out leftover pieces of wool?” I asked,...
Click here to listen. Talk about ink in one’s veins! This birth announcement, created by my dad, is prominently displayed in my baby book from 1948. My mother, too, had a way of making things newsworthy just by naming them. When a neighbor in the Midwest...
Click here to listen. I took a hard stumble in mid-September, broke my shoulder and have had to pivot my well-organized life to accommodate what is. Still, I’m able to create exciting new digital mock-ups of wall installations. My fantasy: I would announce to you...
Click here to listen. This post tells the story of an exception to the rule of thumb: Never meet your heroes. In the early ’70s, when my art students from Westhill High School competed in the state’s Scholastic Art Awards annual competition, we were upstaged and...
As a fan of the Rule of Three, I mulled over what would complete my list for this month’s newsletter inspiration. It all started, serendipitously, while I was in Iceland on vacation last month and received an email from one of my collectors. She wanted me to see...
As a kid in the 50’s, I played a game called 7-Up. All you needed was a Spalding ball and a wall. Our garage was the perfect arena for mastering the seven different challenges of throwing the pink sphere against a flat surface: allowing it to bounce, catch it...
On waking each morning I meditate for 23.5 minutes (a TM practice) as a way to connect with myself before interacting with others. I then take in an uplifting page from my daily reader which helps open up my connection to the world beyond my own thoughts. Then, as...
I was 19 years old when Mr. Oliver Allyn, the Chairman of the Department of Theatre Arts, took me aside and said, “I want to proselytize you to become a theatre major.” It was 1968, and I was enrolled in the entry-level course, Theatre 145, at Mount Holyoke College...
Driving down William Street toward our house in Connecticut, a full moon lit up the winter-black sky. “Ach!” I exclaimed to my family of passengers, the ‘ah’ catching in my throat from the emotion behind my pleasure. Henceforth, that monthly spectacle was labeled...
Each time I visit my grandsons in NJ, I bring a surprise. It could be folding a dollar bill into an origami shirt, sharing a fun painting technique (making roses using a plastic bag), or introducing silly riddles or word games. I listen for cues to...
In reviewing this past year and considering where to put my own feet in 2024, I checked to see where those tootsies had taken me in 2023. I used two tools for that measurement: my Google Calendar and the spreadsheet I keep for calls with my action partner....
Lilli Weisz, organizer extraordinaire, worked with me last month to carve out a larger and more streamlined area for my textile work. She started our session examining the contents of each desk drawer and inquiring about every item within. She pointed to a...
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