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PRESIDENT Jehadu Abshiro
EDITOR Alyssa High
INTERNS Abbie Fleeman | Varsha Jhanak
DESIGNERS Jynnette Neal | Lauren Allen
OPERATIONS MANAGER Alessandra Quintero
SALES Michele Paulda |Frank McClendon | Linda Kenney
Cover by Lauren Allen
As our interns left for the summer, the two young ladies that I was blessed to work with throughout the season helped put together this year’s women’s edition. It’s gone through several rebrands: Boss Babes. Fierce Females. Women’s edition.
Whatever you want to call it, getting to celebrate the accomplishments of the women behind Plano government, nonprofits, dining, hobbies and businesses was extra special to share this year with these Plano-area teens. So thank you to UNT’s Scripps Howard Emerging Journalists Program and to the Plano Mayor’s Summer Internship Program for allowing us to host Abbie Fleeman and Varsha Jhanak this summer.
And don’t forget to vote for Best Of Shopping. Voting ends on September 3 and the winners will be revealed in the November/December issue. Readers can also nominate for any category for Best Of 2025 by emailing nominations to alessandra@planomagazine.com.
-Alyssa High Editor
You found success on your health journey, and that brings out our very best. So let’s set new goals and keep winning together.
From colon cancer surgery to stroke care, it’s easy to find care ranked among the best in the nation at BSWHealth.com/Plano.
Saturday, November 16
6:00 – 10:00 PM
Join the American Heart Association for a concert and mission celebration highlighting the lifesaving work of the Association in Collin County. Heart Fest, a Texas-themed concert and mission celebration, is an evening filled with delectable food, exciting auctions, and a performance by country artist Drake Milligan. Heart Fest honors survivors, unites local community members and business leaders and raises critical funds.
When you’re looking for in-home care for yourself or someone you love, the choice is an important one. Let us guide you through your options, help you with your questions, and provide you with personalized, compassionate attention. When you need support at home, choose wisely. Choose CC Young.
Visit ccyoung.org or call 469-632-8448 for help in choosing the right type of in-home care.
DESPITE DROPPING OUT OF COLLEGE AND HAVING A “VERY TURBULENT YOUNG LIFE,” AZMINA PIRANI SAYS SHE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE AN ENTREPRENEUR.
She started her first business in her early twenties: a meditation center in McKinney.
“I had no idea what I was getting into,” she says. “I didn’t even work at a meditation center priorly, so I had no knowledge about what it all takes.”
The business closed after about two years, when Pirani realized just how tough it was to start something from scratch without a network.
“I had no family or friends at the time who were business owners, so I was very lonely. I think it took a very emotional toll,” Pirani says. “So, I took a break for about a year.”
Pirani recalled a vendor market she’d attended while operating her meditation center. It was November in Celina, and quite cold. However, the market’s beverages only included margaritas and wine, despite the thirtysomething degree weather.
Pirani thought of the idea for Snug Mug right then – a mobile beverage bar serving up hot cocoas with a variety of toppings.
By the end of that week, all of the supplies and licensing had been completed.
“I knew it was almost meant to be because I had zero advertising, I just did this as a side gig to my full-time business, and one of my first clients were the Cowboys,” Pirani says. “That’s how I knew it was going to take off. You don’t get large clients like that just pop into your lap, especially when you have no PR, no marketing, nothing like that.”
This season (October through January) is the fourth for Snug Mug, which will also be releasing packaged hot cocoa mix this year, and Snug Mug Collaborated Baked Goods can be found in bakeries in Frisco and Allen.
“It makes people so happy,” Pirani says. “If I want to take it deeper, which I will, because of course I ran a meditation center, I think people forget that it’s the simple things in life that make you smile. I feel like a lot of times, adults don’t even know how to have fun anymore. They restrict themselves. They’re very rigid. It’s nice to see people get loose and very excited.”
Despite closing her original meditation studio, Pirani kept up with a “holistic lifestyle.”
“It never left me. I took a break because I couldn’t handle it. I didn’t have a community I could bounce off. I didn’t have friends that I
could ask for advice or collaborate with,” Pirani says. “But now I’m in a position where I do have all of that and my passion is to teach people that you can have inner peace and inner strength no matter what part of life you’re in.”
Pirani opened up a pop-up meditation studio and wellness center, Prana & Co., that partners with corporations and organizations to offer yoga classes, wellness coaching, meditation and other services.
“People here, especially in Dallas, are just so go-go-go,” Pirani says. “A quiet space is not a thing for them even in their house. So if we can bring it to their work or team building, it just makes me really happy to see other people have that peace.”
Aside from these businesses, Pirani focuses a lot of her time on working with nonprofits and local businesses to raise money for organizations benefiting women and children. Recently, these fundraisers give toward the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund (PCRF), an international charity that provides medical aid to children in Palestine.
“Most of my career, I haven’t had the support I expected to have on a personal level, other than my fiancé, and that’s been my push and motivation as to why I’m so active with fundraisers and trying to help women and children in the Middle East,” Pirani says. “And although I don’t physically know what they’ve gone through, I do feel for them. I know what it feels like to be alone. I know what it feels like when you feel like the whole world is against you or you’re just feeling so helpless that you don’t know what to do.”
According to Pirani, she has been able to donate over $10,000 in recent years to PCRF.
“I could not have done it without local businesses,” she says. “Through 10 years of running a business, I have seen that it’s the smallest businesses that lead with heart. They run their business off value, and they stay true to themselves.”
“I think if you’re a business owner, you’ve automatically taken on the responsibility to better your community, and have that motivation through your own heart. I think that if you can’t do that, you’re not a business owner. You’re not meant to do this. Entrepreneurship is far from being rich. I don’t know any entrepreneur that’s actually rich. I think that all of us are running in circles, just trying to figure it out.”
Assassination Roller Derby is Plano’s window into the world of women’s most popular contact sport
If you ask any of the Assassination City Roller Derby teammates what got them into the sport, you’re likely to hear one of two answers: Whip It or through a friend who got into it from watching Whip It.
Roller derby has been around in some form or fashion for nearly a century, and the sport has been through many iterations before becoming what it is today. Racing across the country. Showmanship with full blows. An International Roller Derby League was created and then ceased to exist before the ‘80s.
But in 2001, a group of Texan women brought the sport back into the public eye with narrowly defined rules and a clear feminist voice. Then, in 2009, Drew Barrymore brought together a star-studded cast to tell the story of an up-and-coming derby girl (played by Elliot, then Ellen, Page) in a small town outside of Austin, bringing the sport to televisions all over the world, televisions that brought many of Plano’s very own Assassination City Roller Derby teammates together.
Assassination City is one of 441 leagues across six continents in the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA), one of two major roller derby associations. (The other is USA Roller Sports, or USARS, which is recognized by the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee as the National Governing Body for competitive roller sports in the U.S.)
The league started in 2005, formerly based in Dallas, giving it the Assassination City name. It moved to Thunderbird Roller Rink in 2015 as a skaterowned and operated LLC, with each participating skater owning a part of the company itself.
There’s five teams based in the semicentury-old Plano staple: one travel team that competes against teams from all over the state, Conspiracy, and four home teams that compete primarily against each other: the Bombshell Brigade, the Lone Star Assassins, The Deadly Kennedys and ¡Viva La Revolución!
The game is simple. “Like rugby on wheels,” Lone Star Assassins captain Rory Killmore says. There are two teams of five skaters on a flat, oval track. There are two 30-minute periods broken up into units called Jams, which last up to two minutes with a 30-second break in between.
Four blockers and one jammer take to the rink. The jammer wears a helmet with a star on it so she’s easy to spot. The jammer is important here – she’s the only one that can score points. Jammers from both teams start out behind both teams’ packs of blockers, and they score points for every opposing blocker they pass each lap.
Of female-dominated sports, roller derby is widely considered the only full-contact game in the lineup. However, that does not mean that there’s no rules to protect them. Skaters are not allowed to use their heads, elbows, forearms, hands, knees, lower legs or feet to make contact with opponents. If you want to take someone down, you’re going to have to throw your body into it.
“It’s a really, really good personal challenge, because you can choose to compete with your teammates or other teams, but in the end you’re
competing with yourself to see if you could do better,” UKillLele, co-captain of Lone Star Assassins, says.
BUZZ KILLER – CONSPIRACY CO-CAPTAIN
WHAT GOT YOU INTO THE SPORT?
I got into roller derby like a lot of people did – I saw Whip It . At that time I was in college, and I didn’t know that there was anybody nearby. My husband and I moved up here and he had a co-worker who had done it back in the day and we realized that [the league] was less than 15 minutes from my house, so I was like, “Well I gotta try it.” Seven years later, I’m still here.
WHAT WOULD YOU SAY TO SOMEONE WHO IS LOOKING TO GET INTO ROLLER DERBY?
You’ve got to give it a chance. Everybody who plays it falls in love with it immediately. After one practice I was hooked, and that’s the story for most people here. It’s a great community of people. All my best friends now are derby people, and a big part of that is we just spend a lot of time together, because it’s a great community of people who are supportive of your goals and this league is a really safe space to be. We have a lot of people who feel like they can’t always be themselves outside of these doors, but here they can be. So it’s a great way to get in shape and meet people while doing something good for your body.
KITTY CATATONIC – CONSPIRACY
WHAT GOT YOU INTO THE SPORT?
I started 10 years ago, and my daughter was in gymnastics. There was a mom at the same gym who played with Assassination and put fliers down on a desk. It was two or three months before I could make it [to come see Assassination.] But once I sat down and was watching for five minutes, I was 100% in. I literally signed up the next month.
WHAT WOULD YOU SAY TO SOMEONE WHO IS LOOKING TO GET INTO ROLLER DERBY?
This is a very empowering space for women. Growing up, there were no real contact sports for women. It lets you use your body in the same way that boys are taught to use their bodies from the time they’re born, where girls were sort of taught to sit down and be pretty and have tea parties and play with dolls. And we don’t all want to play with dolls. Some of us want to get out there and use our bodies and our minds. It’s very much a mental game as well.
Like Jimmy Fallon ( Whip It ’s “Hot Tub” Johnny Rocket) said, “These girls are lean, mean skating machines.”
The league hosts Welcome Wagons — meetings for prospective members — on the first Sunday and Wednesday of each month. Those that want to join a team are prepared to play through the league’s Fresh Meat program, which teaches the game, skating and other skills and conditioning necessary to play for the home teams. All games are held at Thunderbird Roller Rink in Central Plano.
Zato
Cuisine
Janie Burkett and her family create southern food restaurant, The Biscuit Bar
story Abbie Fleeman | photography Kathy Tran
Comfort food provided solace in a time of grief for Janie Burkett.
In 2016, Janie and Jake Burkett welcomed twin girls, Brycee Jo and Blake into their family. Tragedy soon struck when Brycee Jo passed away due to an infection. As the Burketts mourned and family and friends supported them, food helped significantly in their healing process.
After their surviving baby got out of the NICU, her health prevented the Burketts from traveling. So, for the 2016 holiday season, the Burketts’ extended family came to their home. During this time, they made large comfort food meals for everyone that included staples like fried chicken, sausage, gravy and bacon. One dish stood out among the rest: biscuits.
For New Year’s Eve dinner, they created a “build-your-own biscuit bar” with a variety of toppings for customized biscuits and biscuit sandwiches. From this meal, the idea for Janie and Jake’s restaurant The Biscuit Bar was born.
“My husband, whose background is in venture capital, thought, ‘Hey, if we would be willing to buy this from a restaurant, somebody else probably would as well,’” Burkett says.
The family had no prior experience in the restaurant industry, but decided to go for it anyway. This idea became a reality in 2018 when the first The Biscuit Bar location opened in Plano at The Boardwalk at Granite Park. Since then, the business has opened five additional locations in Deep Ellum, Coppell, Arlington, Abilene and Fort Worth. Some of these locations were opened during the pandemic and generated enough revenue to survive today.
“What is unique about our approach is that we are fast casual, we have a full bar and are open for dinner,” Burkett says. “A lot of the breakfast and brunch places close at 2 or 3 p.m. We are still open until 9 or 10 p.m. And in some cases, till 3 a.m.”
The menu centers biscuits in almost every meal. There are myriad sandwich combinations on the menu including the bacon, egg and cheese; grilled chicken and Burkett’s personal favorite: the Philly cheesesteak biscuit sandwich.
The Biscuit Bar also offers tots, salads, desserts and smaller biscuit sandwiches for kids 12 and under.
Although she was born in Texas, Burkett grew up around Denver, Colorado. She would visit her grandmother in the South once or twice a year as a child and looked forward to tasting her southern cooking, she says, remembering canning mayhaw jelly with her and eating it with biscuits.
Her grandfather also inspired Burkett’s love for comfort food. He came up with the idea for The Biscuit Bar’s October special: pumpkin pie french toast.
The Biscuit Bar was designed to feel like a modern take on “Grandma’s Kitchen.” The Plano location has a tile backsplash, wood tables and a big farm sink in the front to achieve this look.
The restaurant business is a male-dominated industry, especially when it comes to leadership positions like the one Burkett holds, she says.
“I’ve noticed that the biggest challenge for women in the restaurant industry is simply if they are going to have babies or not,” Burkett says. “Because if they are, it’s a challenge for them to be able to find child care and be able to continue their career throughout that process.”
Burkett is on a task force with the Texas Restaurant Association that aims to help push legislation through the next legislative session in Texas in 2025 that would provide more options for restaurant workers that need access to affordable childcare. This would enable more women to take leadership positions in the restaurant industry while ensuring their children are cared for, she says.
Through their expansion, The Biscuit Bar keeps biscuits and comfort food at the focal point.
“Grandma’s cooking is different from what we would have in Denver,” Burkett says, “So it’s something we always looked forward to. We’re glad to put some southern home cooking on the menu for lots of folks.”
The Biscuit Bar , The Boardwalk at Granite Park, 5880 State Hwy 121 #102b, 469.238.2227, thebiscuit.bar
How Plano City
Councilme mber Maria Tu went from international law to Plano C ity Council
story Alyssa High | photography
For District 1 Councilmember Maria Tu, a significant difference between growing up in Taiwan and living in the United States is the way that people relate to the law. She recalls noticing that, in Taiwan, she’d never seen someone stop at a stop light if there were no cars coming, and her dad had to teach her that road rules were different here.
“The law is the culture in America, so that’s when I became really interested in [law as a career,]” she says.
Tu obtained a bachelor’s degree in political economy from The Evergreen State College in Washington State at just 19 years old. From there, she interned with Seattle HUD, the public defender’s office and was a correspondence supervisor for U.S. Sen. Dan Evans in Washington D.C.
She returned home later to obtain her juris doctorate, then had subsequent jobs working as a full-time law clerk for the Washington Education Association and the law clerk for the Kitsap County Superior Court.
“Perhaps I was fortunate that at age 20, I learned from Senator Dan that to be a true public servant, it really didn’t matter what political party one belonged to, as long as we always had the best interest of the people we served in our actions and in our hearts,” Tu once said.
Even in Washington State, a large part of Tu’s focus was on supporting others of Asian heritage, serving on boards and associations for the Seattle Asian Chamber of Commerce, Seattle Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, Seattle Asian Women Association, Washington State Chinese Engineer Association, Washington State Cung Hua Association and as a member of the Hong Kong Ship Owners Association.
After graduating from law school with a concentration in Asian law studies, Tu worked for Wiliams, Kaster & Gibbs, who was trying to build their international presence in Asia.
“I was the rainmaker (person who attracts clients) in the law firm, a top six law firm in Washington State at that time and all I was doing was flying,” Tu says. “I was flying to Asia every three months and bringing clients over. There are a lot of rich people who are in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, which is why I hated my job. I couldn’t stand dealing with them.”
Tired of dealing with the constant travel and stress, Tu and her husband left their jobs, home and certainty behind and moved to Texas.
“We didn’t realize how great [Plano ISD] was until the night she started going to school. It was just like ‘wow’ and she was competing with the best,” Tu says. “So we just ended up staying, we never moved out.”
When the couple first came to DFW, Tu’s now-late husband was a sushi chef. The two owned a Chinese restaurant that served sushi on its buffet.
When Tu visited a nearby Whole Foods Market, she noticed that they didn’t have sushi, noting that most grocery stores in Washington had a plethora of sushi options. She pitched to the store for her husband’s restaurant, Yamamoto Sushi, to consign with the chain. After over a month of discussion that seemed to make no headway, Tu says, they finally said yes.
“We were exclusively doing [local] Whole Foods sushi for seven and a half years,” Tu says. “Of course, after WholeFoods came on board, every freaking grocery store in the whole DFW area was like, ‘Well, we want sushi in our store.’”
Yamamoto has been credited as the first company to sell sushi directly in grocery stores across North Texas, though the couple sold the company several years ago.
After her daughter was settled into school, Tu became a prosecutor at the Collin County District Attorney’s office, where she was the first Chinese prosecutor despite the still-growing Asian population in the county.
However, as her daughter got older, Tu left behind law temporarily and shifted to a different type of service – city council.
Since 2019, Tu has represented Place 1 (essentially everything east of Alma), when she beat Daniel Long for the place by 16%. She ran unopposed for reelection in 2023.
Running on the priorities of reducing traffic congestion, keeping property taxes low and maintaining quality of life in suburban areas, Tu is also proud to be the first Asian American City Council member.
Today, however, Tu says that Plano’s focus now needs to be on attracting young families and addressing the aging population.
“The main issue that Plano is facing is that we’re getting old,” Tu says. “Plano sort of grew up with me. When I came, I was in my 30s and Plano was probably in their 30s. So now that I am getting to the retirement age, Plano’s also getting to that point, so it has to revamp itself.”
Now a widow and an empty nester, Tu says that Plano has to focus on getting senior adults like her to downsize.
“In order for a young family to come in and get 2,800 square foot houses with three or four bedrooms, you’ve got to get senior citizens out of there so that families can move in,” Tu says. “We have to somehow get them to downsize to someplace that is attractive, not pushing them out of the city, but rather getting them to look at alternative housings. That’s what’s going to make sure that the younger family can move in and start this new life cycle.”
Tu says she plans to do just that after her term ends, keeping her current house to ensure that she stays in the district that she serves.
Maintaining her private practice since 2005, Tu still takes on cases, but only the ones that she feels need her services the most, like certain criminal, family and immigration law cases.
“It took 10 years for me to realize that the most important thing in my life is not the admiration and envy of others, but what makes me the happiest,” Tu says on her website. “In 2004, I finally had enough courage to come back to the practice of law. I fell in love with being in the courtroom fighting the difficult fights. In the courthouse, I have cried, laughed, screamed, yelled, shouted, hated and loved, and all could happen in one day. My colleagues have described me as ‘a lawyer with a passion.’ Whatever... I love being in the courtroom.”
She also has served on the Collin County Lawyers Association, Leadership Plano Class 36, the Plano Chamber of Commerce, Texas Bar Foundation, Texas Diversity Council and the NIHAO Food Bank Initiative.
“You don’t have to believe my words, just look at what I do,” Tu says. “The most important thing is the ability to use my talent and my strength to help those who don’t have it. That’s my passion.”
Zo the Elephant, the school's mascot, helps children process emotions by modeling how to handle separation anxiety, reinforcing positive behaviors and modeling ageappropriate behaviors.
story Varsha Jhanak | photography Amani Sodiq
When walking into the Learning Cube Academy, the vibrant colors catch your eyes. Surrounded by drawings from kids and class pictures, the atmosphere is comforting and ideal for learning.
Learning Cube Academy (LCA) is a private preschool run by Veena Kashyap and Chaitra Giridhara.
Both have substantial teaching experience. Teaching runs in Giridhara’s family. Her father was an English professor at University of Mysore in India and her mother established a school in his name. Giridhara volunteered in the school before attending university and eventually worked at a bank. After moving to the United States, Giridhara returned to teaching, starting as a volunteer and later becoming a substitute teacher for about seven years.
With around 35 years of teaching experience, Kashyap began teaching English and math while in university. After working in customer service, Kashyap returned to teaching and taught students of all ages, from preschool to middle school. Kashyap had previous experience owning academic institutes, including a preschool in India and a learning center.
“I was very clear, I wanted to do something,” Kashyap says. “But this time I wanted to do it with a partner, otherwise I wouldn’t have even ventured into this. So, because I had explored and I always wanted to do something, I was always looking for an opportunity.”
Kashyap approached Giridhara with the idea of opening a preschool together. With encouragement from their families, they decided to go for it. After buying a location in March 2019, the school underwent around eight months of renovations. Finally, LCA opened its doors in January 2020.
Then, the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Kashyap and Giridhara had to scrap their plan and start fresh. They moved their students online and recorded videos to teach the students remotely. They were able to teach students from all over the world, from India to Amsterdam. As the pandemic went on, they were able to bring enrichment, math, English and even art into their curriculum.
LCA finished the 2023-24 school year with 56
students and had 46 at this year’s summer camp. They will begin the 2024-2025 academic year with 25 students, which can grow as enrollment is year-round.
LCA maintained the curriculum they developed during their early years online, transporting everything in person. LCA values adaptability and works with each child’s unique requirements. They don’t operate as a strict facility, rather they take the best practices, philosophies and methodologies to teach their students.
“A lot of things are learning through playing,” Giridhara says. “We have manipulators for everything and we have enough options for them to learn. Some kids might be visual learners, some kids might be just auditory. We train teachers that way so that teachers can figure out in the first one or two weeks how the child learns, because not every child is the same. The teachers are very loving. Once [teachers] build trust through love and care, kids get very comfortable once they know that they’re safe here and they’re happy.”
“Our core values are three R’s: respect, responsibility and relationship,” Kashyap says. “We respect each other no matter what their age is and we treat them as individuals, not based on their age. We are responsible for what we teach and we are responsible for what [students] are doing. We teach that it is OK to make a mistake and learn through it. Then, we value relationships; that community with individuals, with teachers. That is something that is our core value. We really value that and that is how we stand out.”
Both Kashyap and Giridhara learned more than just how to educate through LCA: they learned people management and applied it to their everyday lives. But most importantly, they were able to take part in starting children’s’ learning journey, having a major impact on their growth,
“Being a part of [the students’] life and [seeing] how they transformed from the beginning of the year to the end was amazing for me to see,” Giridhara says. “They grow up so much both emotionally and they learn a lot. They’re like two or three years old, but the way they transform is totally different, which kind of made me stay in the field and not deviate. I think that’s the reason I never went back to any other different job.”
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COFFEE. MOST PEOPLE KNOW IT AS A DRINK. One can find it in many forms: cappuccino, latte, mocha.
However, Amy Whitaker is redefining the way people use coffee in a unique way – through art.
As a child, Whitaker traveled around the world for her father’s job. She was born in Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania and lived there for the first six years of her life. Whitaker later attended the University of Kansas, receiving a degree in journalism with a concentration in business communications. After settling in Oklahoma for a while, Whitaker moved to Plano six years ago for a business opportunity for her husband.
Though she was a lifelong art lover, she never formally studied the subject before.
Whitaker began with pencil sketches. Finding a natural talent in the medium, Whitaker began a program called Works of HeART where she would draw images of American soldiers for their families. While living in Oklahoma, she also sketched portraits of her
oldest children’s graduating classes, sketching every student and spending time with them in the studio. Whitaker eventually began incorporating acrylics into her work, creating her “Baby Brights” which combined pencil sketches and acrylic paintings to paint animals found in Africa.
“One night I had gotten the kids to bed, and I decided [to] just try to draw,” Whitaker says. “I hadn’t drawn in a long time and I got some pencils out and had a glass of wine. And I’m sitting there at the kitchen table just drawing and all of a sudden, I was like, ‘Wow, this actually kind of looks like the person I’m trying to draw. This is fantastic.’ So I really enjoyed pencil drawing and I liked just the simplicity of it. I didn’t know anything about color and mixing and all of that. So, I just stuck with pencils for a while.”
But the question still stands: how did Whitaker find coffee as an art medium?
“My daughter came home from school one day,
and she had had a visiting artist that actually was doing pen drawings, which then he would splatter with coffee,” Whitaker says. “She said ‘you can paint with coffee, too.’ And I said, ‘I don’t think you can.’ She showed us so I said, ‘Well, let’s get some watercolor paper and just try it.’ We got all the supplies we needed. I had a fresh batch of coffee in the kitchen, and we sat down, and the kids stayed with me for probably like 30 minutes, but four hours later, I’m still at the table painting and saying, ‘This is amazing.’”
Whitaker uses instant coffee with water to paint her creations. Occasionally, when people travel, they bring Whitaker coffee from other countries which she utilizes to paint. By combining more water with coffee or layering the coffee, Whitaker is able to add dimension to her pieces. As she explores this new medium, she keeps learning more about coffee art.
“ I had someone walk by and just say, ‘well, that’s a lot of brown paint,’” Whitaker says. “I’m always fascinated by people that are drawn in by the African animals that I paint because I feel like even if they’ve never been to Africa or don’t really have a story to go with it, there’s something really unique and special about these wild creatures. I have had people say, ‘Well, can I smell?’ I think people are just kind of intrigued by it.”
Whitaker has a large social media presence, with almost 24,000 followers on Instagram. Whitaker’s art is available for purchase at Lekka Retail Concepts, a shop that supports local artists. As a member of the Plano Arts Association, Whitaker also attends various art shows and also does commissioned works through Instagram or her website, Art by Amy. Prices range depending on design and size.
With all her different art ventures, Whitaker is still learning and growing along with her art.
“It’s really meaningful,” Whitaker says. “I love people, but I am kind of an introvert and enjoy just kind of being behind the scenes. I’m kind of uncomfortable with a lot of praise for that kind of thing. But, I’m getting better and learning to kind of just embrace it and enjoy it.”
Whitaker’s upcoming event is an Arts Festival on Sept. 28 at The Shops of Willow Bend from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Whitaker is also gearing up to host coffee painting classes at Local Good Coffee in Central Plano.
story Alyssa High
“[BY] SHARING JUST THAT NAME, WE ARE SO PROUD AND SHARING THAT WE SUPPORT THE COMMUNITY AND WE HELP THIS CAUSE BECAUSE WE ARE PHILANTHROPISTS TOO,” Texas Muslim Women’s Foundation CEO Mona Kafeel says.
Don’t let the name give you a preconceived notion. Texas Muslim Women’s Foundation (TMWF) might have been founded by Muslim women, and is still proud of that identity, but the nonprofit’s service boundaries go far beyond the confines of their Plano offices and shelters and serve women, children and families of all genders, religions and backgrounds.
TMWF started shortly after 9/11 by Muslim women who “felt the need to be out and about and share with people that what media is portraying is not who we are.”
Kafeel came into TMWF first as a volunteer when the organization was only two years old. Since then, she has grown into different positions on the board to staff positions and, since 2020, CEO. The nonprofit has grown too, she says. In 2008, there were only 83 clients served. Now, she says, that number is in the thousands.
“And the reason for that growth is the Plano area,” Kafeel says. “The Plano area is so diverse now as opposed to 20 years ago and with that diversity, as you see new businesses popping up and new families moving in, you see these new family dynamics also.”
According to Kafeel, there are a lot of things that make the organization unique. Many of the women do not speak English and cannot share their stories
ordinarily, she says. To mitigate the issue, there are about 22 languages spoken among the all-female staff, which consists of family and immigration attorneys, counselors and domestic violence shelter employees.
THE SERVICES THAT THE ORGANIZATION HAS OFFERED ARE MYRIAD:
• Two 24/7 crisis shelters for survivors of family and domestic violence
• More than 27 transitional apartments, including HUD Rapid Re-Housing
• A united community of Imams (Muslim religious leaders) in North Texas with a zero-tolerance pledge against domestic violence
• Ongoing interfaith dialogues and activities
• Spearheading the creation of the Contemporary Arab & Muslim Cultural Institute at the University of North Texas
• Providing training and education on domestic violence, online safety for youth, mental wellness, financial literacy and women’s entrepreneurship.
Throughout each of these programs, the organization focuses on two phrases: culturallysensitive and trauma-informed.
Cultural sensitivity requires knowledge of various cultures and how religion, nationality, race and other factors affect family dynamics.
“In family law the cases take way more time than
in immigration,” Kafeel says. “They are messy if you don’t understand that cultural aspect of the survivor, the layers of trauma, the layers of issues that the attorney needs to tackle … our in-house attorney knows the cultures. She understands that there’s so many layers when we talk about domestic violence within minorities.”
According to Pew Research Center, about a quarter of Asian, Black and Hispanic households are multigenerational, nearly double that of white families. This dynamic means that while one could assume that domestic violence refers to intimate partner violence, in other communities the perpetrator could be a mother-in-law or other extended family member, Kafeel says.
For trauma-informed care, Kafeel says it often is as simple as ensuring that the women and children have agency over their own decisions.
“Every week, the shelter housing advocates and the staff sit with the clients and ask them to plan their menu for the next week, so they get to cook for themselves, which means that they start getting that power of decision making,” Kafeel says. “A lot of times when these women come through our doors, the decision making has been taken away by the abuser … If somebody is going through trauma, we don’t dictate [their lives] because somebody was already controlling their life.”
Most women and families that the organization serves are referred through local businesses and faith-based organizations like churches, mosques and other nonprofits.
“Whether it’s a church or a mosque, they will find smaller groups and they will find some way to share their [experience of] domestic violence,” Kafeel says. “A lot of women know that our mosque here supports domestic violence survivors because we have a close partnership with them.”
Kafeel says the organization has become so synonymous with the community that city boards, commissions and city council members – several of whom she met through Leadership Plano – will get calls from smaller groups and refer individuals to TMWF.
Now, TMWF asks that the community continue sharing content from the organization on social media and with word-of-mouth.
“If you know somebody is going through domestic violence and you share my content, she will have a resource,” Kafeel says. “When we talk about one in four women [going through domestic violence,] you have so many friends and quite a few will go through domestic violence … For that purpose, social media presence is so critical and interacting on that level will help save many lives.”
11am – 5pm
Saturday Oct 19 th Anniversary Haggard Park, Plano
Music & Dance Kids’ Activities Cultural Booths
Cultural fun for the whole family!
FREE health services and screenings for all ages!
Don’t miss our Wellness Fair! 11am - 2pm
