Pepper Louise Holgate took her first breath in Ogden, UT, on July 10, 2014. An easy baby, full of her mom Jasmine’s passion and her dad Kevin’s tender heart, she was the youngest sibling of her beloved sister Quinn and brother Oliver.

Pepper was a magnetic soul. From the time she could crawl, she roamed her world collecting the loves of her life into a bottomless sack, upending it as time would allow to sort, stack, pile, and color-code all of it. Let’s look inside! The sack was full of stones, gems, crystals, marbles, and seashells. It had puzzles of every kind (the harder the better!). It crawled with ladybugs, roly-polies, snails, soon-to-be pet jumping spiders, and green caterpillars she refused to kill but instead moved to neighbor Gary’s flower bed. The Bountiful house was the only home she ever knew, and the backyard sandbox was her ultimate sanctuary.

School did not come easy for Pepper, but she adored her teachers at Foxboro Elementary. When Pepper found out that some people make a living by creating art, it was groundbreaking. She learned to stress less about math homework and leaned into her passions to create. She loved oil pastels, rock painting, Shrinky Dinks, clay figurines, chalk art, and lately had developed the fine, delicate painting skills of a budding nail technician. All these materials sprawled across a dining room table converted for weeks at a time into her arts-and-crafts station.

Pepper cherished all life, be it plant, human, or animal (except for worms, which could all die a miserable death as far as she was concerned). She built terrarium habitats. She hunted snakes and insects with her late Grammy. For months on end, Pepper dressed in cheetah print from head to toe. She wore kitty ears and hissed like a cat if you crossed her. And when “Bat O’Clock” came, Pepper and Jasmine would lie in the dark of a backyard hammock and squeal with delight when the bats swooped overhead.

At ten years old, flying high above the earth on her first airplane ride, Pepper exclaimed, “I had no idea you could get up here and see so much. It goes on forever!”

Looking out Pepper’s window now, what might we see? A giggling girl hiking to Tunnel Springs, with a feral rat’s nest of hair, yelling, “Hola Muchachos!” Getting her groove on in early morning dance parties before leaving for school. Circling the driveway on the bike she taught herself to ride, beaming with pride. A sneaky sardine hiding among the hoodoos at Goblin Valley, eluding capture while echoing, “Caw-Caw!” And with a boba drink in one hand and Lola at her heels, Pepper letting everyone know it was “accent hour,” meaning all were expected to communicate only in their best English or Australian accents.

On what Pepper described as “the best night of my life,” she sat on her dad’s shoulders at a Noah Kahan concert and belted every word she knew. She fiercely loved her many friends and family, especially her brother and sister. Kind, compassionate, silly, emotionally attuned, enormously empathic, and true to her name, she was a spice that added absolute joy to every world she touched.

In recent months, we became aware that Pepper had some kind of heart condition, and she showed great resilience fighting the symptoms. Despite our best efforts to address the concerns, she passed unexpectedly on May 14, 2026. We gratefully acknowledge the valiant efforts of the paramedics and doctors who tried to save her. Our world is crushed. Picking ourselves up and moving forward feels impossible. But we are looking out your window, Peppy Lou, and what we see stretches endlessly beyond the horizon. And like your favorite singer sings, “Oh, some things live forever, even when they die. Oh my, my, my, my, my!”

A viewing will be held Friday, May 22, from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. Funeral services will be held Saturday, May 23, at 11:00 a.m., with a viewing one hour prior to services. All services will take place at The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Bountiful. Adelaide Ward at 3599 South Orchard Drive, Bountiful Utah, 84010.