Michelle Rigsby used puzzle time to reconnect with her busy family in Rockwall. In the process, she gave birth to a puzzle business.

Reggie and Michelle Rigsby recognized their busy schedule. Michelle Rigsby also knew her family needed to talk and bond more. So, she tossed ideas around during the pandemic to make that happen. 

Board games? Been there, done that. Then, puzzles came into her thought bubble.

"I'm like, 'You know what I haven't done in a long time is puzzles.' And I loved puzzles when I was a kid. I love them," Michelle Rigsby said.

The 49-year-old software engineer said it was during the pandemic. Puzzle time, according to the Rigsbys, worked. The time around the table produced much-desired conversation, even as Michelle Rigsby was the puzzle queen.

"She'll do the bulk of the puzzle, and we come around and put two or three pieces in and we'll pat ourselves on the back, right?" Reggie Rigsby said. "But what she still achieved was that conversation that happens around the table."

The process also gave way to a business idea. Michelle Rigsby wanted cultural puzzles for her family but did not find the market she anticipated for puzzles from Black-owned businesses. She started building "Pieces of Us by Us."

Her grand idea was to put fine art on puzzle pieces. Her husband said he didn't get the concept. Reggie Rigsby wasn't the only person. As Michelle Rigsby pitched the idea to artists, the response was not favorable.

"They were like No. You're not putting my artwork on a puzzle," She recalled. "No. No, it don't even make sense."

Michelle Rigsby knew enough about graphics and art to begin creating the concept. Little by little, she designed their first puzzle art, "Dance Party."

Her husband and the artists started to come around. They had three artists to help, and that number grew.

A Dallas-based artist, William Toliver, signed on to Pieces of Us by Us. The Rigsbys provided a new way for consumers to access art and offered compensation.

"I thought of it more from the logistical side of like, well, how could this work?" Toliver said. "How can it work for both them and for me as well?"

Toliver's "The Book of Isaiah" is one of the Rigbys' top-selling puzzles. It shows a toddler wearing glasses, leaning on a selected stack of books. The child could be Toliver, who said the chosen books were recommended to him because his mother and uncle read them.

The Garland art teacher said the puzzle company also offered a safe community for him.

"A lot of artists, we fear that our work just gets taken, and then we don't get any type of residual profit from it," he said.

Michelle Rigsby's list of refusals has now become a waiting list of artists whose pieces sell outside of galleries because of their novelty and access.

"We have artists that are from Brazil, from Kenya, from Ethiopia, from Dallas, St. Louis, New Jersey, I mean, literally all over the globe," Michelle Rigsby said.

Reggie Rigsby said they are signing on with an unnamed talent who recently signed a deal with Hulu and HBO. He said they are even making room for the child drawing in their room but haven't figured out marketing.

"I don't think your average puzzle that you can get from a Walmart brings people to tears," Rigsby said. "It's the stories behind the art and what that accomplishes that allows people to connect and get emotional."

The couple's garage, for now, is where inventory is stacked on shelves: puzzles and large-scale replicas of the art.

Michelle Rigsby also said she's witnessed the mental and emotional benefits of puzzle art. Putting the pieces together is therapeutic for her. She's battled depression and anxiety — mental health issues run in her family.

In her collection are two unique pieces of her heart; her older sister, Tina, and younger sister, Melody, died within nine months of each other. "Natural Melody" and "Yara"(Because Tina loved the purple) are in honor of lives lost to stroke and leukemia.

These days, paperboard shapes bring joy and a chance to share the combined worlds of art, puzzling, and quality time. 

"These are not your grandma's puzzles. I don't do puppies. I don't do kittens. I don't do landscapes. All of the artwork we do is cultural fine art," Michelle Rigsby said.