My beloved husband constantly laments my love of inanimate objects in my garden. What you see in the above photo is a vintage cement bench sourced from a place called The Smithfield Barn in Downingtown, PA a couple of years ago and a tiny Buddha sourced from a place called Brandywine View Antiques in Chadds Ford PA last summer.

Part of creating my garden rests on the theory of art in unexpected places. Now I can’t take credit for that, as that’s the idea of my friend Sherry Tillman who is an artist who also owns this amazing craft store in Ardmore, PA called Past*Present*Future.

My art would be the garden objects I place among my plants and flowers and that includes my vintage seating.

Recently I acquired this amazing but woebegone cast iron set and was a steal of a deal with an estate sale company called Sales by Helen. When it first arrived, I thought maybe I had bit off more than I could chew. (See photo above outlined in pink.)

But some scraping and a few coats of paint later (it was down to the bare and rusting metal in a lot of spots) and I think it looks pretty good.

This makes me happy to have everything placed. I had been on the hunt for a chair but this was a set, so I bought the set…for essentially what I paid for one piece about five years ago someplace else so I know I got a deal!

Now my one chair has a mate again. And the photo above is an optical illusion because the chairs are the same size. And these old chairs aren’t bad to sit in as well as being sturdy since they are made of cast iron!

So my husband smiled this morning, shook his head, and made a comment about his wife and inanimate garden objects. But you know what? All of these things make a garden a garden. It’s not just the plants, it’s the other details. And I am up cycling and recycling vintage items. I am not buying new. A few things I have bought a new like the small birdbath you see above. But my preference for the garden is vintage. Now maybe that’s because of what’s in a lot of my vintage gardening books, but I am not sure.

I will also tell you it is hot again here today. It’s in the 90s. My garden is parched, but at least my face is healing so I hope to get back into it soon. I had another Mohs surgery for skin cancer last week so I haven’t been doing much of anything in the garden. And that in and of itself is hard on me.

My tomato plants are going like gangbusters. And I really like the way they look in pots and grow bags with their teepees made of stakes to grow on.

My chili peppers are also growing really well on our deck in pots but I don’t know what it is about me and how I grow them they aren’t very hot and I planted hot varieties. So this winter I am going to have to research soil and what not. They taste great it’s just I was expecting spicier.

I have been looking at my roses and I think there are a couple that I am going to go full British on and try to plant clematis at their feet this fall for next spring. And once I am out in the garden a little more I need to give them their final feeding of the summer.

I am leaving you with a photo of my giant Rudbeckia. When I first planted them no one liked me very much because I put them near the mailbox and they are about 8 feet tall and attractive so many bees it couldn’t have been fun for the USPS people. So I moved them to the top of the berm on the bed alongside the driveway. It’s dry and sunny and hot just like they like, and I think they look fabulous! They are truly flowers of summer!

Happy gardening!