My Mom's "pot garden".....

I posted this last year when I was in Oregon visiting my family for Thanksgiving.  I was thinking about my Mom's garden over the last few weeks.  Perhaps it's the idea of starting my own "pot garden" at my own new home... but I think it is also because I am feeling the need within myself to take a look at areas in my life that need to have a change in perspective.  I am finding that there are places where I need to step back and take another look, see what needs to be changed and where I can take something that seems ugly and create a new and beautiful place to rest.


Whatever the reason, my Mom's garden is once again my inspiration and I decided to repost this on my blog.  I hope you enjoy it.  It was actually my first attempt at a "blog style" post.  I have updated the pictures from my last trip.






I am at my Parents home for Thanksgiving. It is where I spent most of my growing-up years. It may be that because I am here and helping my Mom with her garden that has released this in my heart. 

Her “garden” is all potted plants, but you would never know that at first glance. You would have to look much deeper to see what was underneath. 

She has taken what was a ugly asphalt area and turned it into a lush garden that is full of colors and smells. She has taken pieces of furniture that were once cast off and made them a part of this amazing place. Toys from the grandchildren’s childhood are hidden in there as well. You can see a “He-man” Tiger that was once bounced on hiding amongst the foliage. His eyes looking at you as if to say, “here I am in my habitat, come and get me”. Month by month she collected wooden slats to put down as a cover and a walkway. There are now plants growing up from underneath that would. The asphalt has become like fertile soil. There are solar lights so that you can sit at night and watch the stars. There is a swinging bench made of iron to sit on. You would think that might be uncomfortable, but it is actually quite relaxing and enjoyable. There is an old chair with it seat removed that makes a perfect fit for a pot growing out of it’s seat. An old iron headboard from a bed becomes something for a climbing vine to grow on. Anything can become something new in this place. 

My Mom made the little table from extra wooden section pieces.  

I have seen this garden as it has grown in person and in pictures. I have watched my Mom garden there and heard her tell me about the new things to be found “just springing up”. About the butterfly’s that have gathered. Mom got a new camera (her first, imagine that) this year. Now she is taking pictures of her garden and finding a whole new place to create with it. I am sure that there will be a book of those pictures some day. Full of all of the memories she has had there. 

old chairs find new life, bird houses get tucked into creative places.

Most would have never seen what my Mother saw could happen in the place. Many would have just done with it what was “expected”... put a car on it. But she saw a place to create. She saw a place to grow beauty. My Mother saw beauty where there was none. What is most amazing is that there is plenty of yard at their house. She could have put a garden anywhere and it would have been beautiful. It would have been “expected”. But my Mother is not one to do just what is expected. She doesn’t always follow the pattern in crafting or in life. She takes what is there and creates from it. What happens is not always what she herself expected, but it is always an adventure.


She has found a place to create where there was once nothing.