Her art is centered on the acequia system in Taos County, Northern, New Mexico and is influenced by traditional Hispano and Indigenous cultures.
[5] After graduating, Jaramillo Lavadie went to Chicago where she worked with the post-humanist muralist Marcos Raya and the A.L.B.A the Association of Latino Brotherhood of Artists.
[6] In the 1970s, Lavadie was part of the Hispano-led La Cofradía de Artes y Artesanos Hispánicos (Cofraternity of Hispanic Artist and Artisans) a cultural and civil rights movement supporting "cultural pride and self-determination through arts", along with fellow artists Luis Tapia, Frederico Vigil, Teresa Archuleta-Sagel and others.
I see a legacy of the warrior's efforts as having transcended more that one generation.”[12] Jaramillo Lavadie's work was included in the 1987 National Museum of Mexican Art exhibit The Barrio Murals.
[13] In 2016 her work was included in the Ciboleros, Comanchero and the People Back Home exhibit at the Gutiérrez Hubbell House and Cultural Center, in the village of Pajarito, Albuquerque, NM.