About Cheri

Hello and welcome to our dream come true!

My mom, Vicky Pace (Vivi Designs), and my sister, Wendy Lambert, and I(freerangepepper) began sharing our dreams of having our own businesses many years ago. With my mom's retirement and my sister navigating a career change, we have been able to work more on aligning our visions and get our website ready. Now that it's finally happening I'd like to share a bit about myself.

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For most of life I have refused to call myself an artist. Even though my childhood was filled with fashion design drawings, fashion shows, making flower arrangements embedded on handmade mud plaques, or just generally decorating things around me, I still did not think of myself as an artist. But then came college and when fashion merchandising was offered at my local college it felt a little less scary than attending the out-of-state colleges that I had received acceptance letters from.

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Fast forward two years, and after some of my completed artwork was stolen from one class and a professor with a very narrow idea of art told me that everything I drew looked like it was from a comic book (now very popularly known as graphic novels, sigh)...I quit school, threw my portfolio into the dumpster, and got a job in an office.

Surprisingly, I thrived. I didn't return to college to finish my bachelor's degree in business until I was in my 30s when I was forced to in order to compete with the thousands of other laid off tech workers in 2001. During all those years, I kept making jewelry for myself and my friends and family.

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Fast forward twenty years. I'm married with two boys that we excitedly welcomed 20 years into our marriage. I completed my masters degree in information systems, which has earned me the privilege of working from home in front of my computer for many hours a day until I retire.

 

In the meantime, I have expanded into making barrettes, pins, and decorations from felt and I am experimenting with recycled tin, deconstructed vintage jewelry, wood cut outs, laser engraving, wire wrapping, and stain glass scraps (thanks, mom!). The more I experiment with incorporating recycled and reused materials, the more I feel like I might possibly be able to call myself an artist. I'm excited to see where the next few years take me!

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