A trip down memory lane begins at Ottie and Clara Ladd’s weathered garden shed. Inside, the gallery of bygone farm tools, vintage sprinklers, and watering cans lines walls and shelves. Outside, the garden brims with birdhouses, wagons, pumps, and spinning whirligigs. Even the garden fence is a museum for a growing collection of aged gardening tools and treasures. The couple has fun in their garden and it shows in the witty scenes they create. Their collection got started when they traveled to Kentucky and Oklahoma to meet each other’s families before getting married. Stops at junkyards and antiques shops in towns along the way garnered 27 used watering cans.

The garden brings to mind farming and gardening of yesteryear. “We love the form along with the function,” says Ottie, pointing to a shed wall that showcases dozens of curvaceous long-spouted watering cans. Diverse collections and plants support each other both visually and in reality. Farm tools—including a fan arrangement of long-handled metal lawn edgers and a round yellow disk festooned with scythes—are precisely arranged as three-dimensional art outside the weathered garden shed. Metal rakes are built right into the fence, their tines sticking up into the air like a rusty-toothed grin.

Warm brown hazelnut shells crunch underfoot on the garden paths. A generous sprinkling of wine corks cushions the shells, tossed from the nearby patio where the Ladds keep a cocktail table and chairs for entertaining. Each object has a story to tell and a joke to share, so guests never lack for conversation.

 
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