Garden Statues

I am obsessed by garden statues. I really love the old ones with moss growing in the cracks and crevices and lichens mottling the surface. Mine are all of cast stone or concrete and have yet to be stroked and spattered by time's relentless hand.
Mabye in the spring I'll try to speed things up with a concoction of fish fertilizer and clay and buttermilk. Oh, and moss spores. I tried it once before with no luck. Maybe there is something in cast stone (a lovely euphemism for concrete?) that is reluctant to allow biological crusties and critters to take hold. This is a statue of a baby satyr, with sweet little hooves and furry legs, cuddling a rabbit. I'm a sucker for statues of children.
I remember as a child growing up in South Carolina and visiting Brookgreen Gardens down near Murrell's Inlet. I loved that bronze statue of the laughing child holding the frogs. My sister and I used to love going to old cemetaries to take pictures. Mostly of ourselves, but sometimes of the statues that were there. This is a statue of two giggling children that I have in my front yard in the hosta bed. I don't want to have one of those yards with twenty statues crowding up the space. But I've got a bad junk bone and given free reign, I could see myself creating a yard that begins to resemble a salvage lot. I'm trying to practice restraint and using the rule "only one statue should be visible at any given time from any given point in the yard." In my backyard a have a statue of Buddha by the pond. It is a sitting Buddha that has been liberally doused with buttermilk in the past but refuses to age. Sometimes leaves fall in his lap and he looks quite contempletive when dappled shadows play across his face. I have a little rabbit of real stone that came from an antique shop in Seattle many years ago. I put felt pads on the bottom and use his as a doorstop inside though. I also bought a copy in cast stone of The Savannah Bird Girl. She seemed such a plaintive figure with her held tilted just so. I haven't found a good spot for her yet. I don't want her to fall over and lose her arms.I don't know what will happen to her finish over time. I haul her in in the winter so she doesn't get damaged. Maybe one day I will cement her to a base or make her a little private grotto to keep her safe.
Then there is the statue I made myself from a stone ball I bought when I lived in Arizona and a chunk of concrete I dug out of the ground when I pulled out the old umbrella style clothesline of the previous owner. I think it sort of looks like an abstract version of the Buddha.

The only statue I have that is getting lichen encrusted--or at least it seems to be in the early stages of encrustation formation--is a lion statue that I bought from Agway about four years ago. He is such a sad, pensive fellow. I have him perched atop some stones overlooking a small pond I have in my front yard.
That way he can keep an eye on the snails and great diving beetles that feed among the water liies and dwarf horsetail rushes. Next year I think I'll give him some goldfish from the backyard pond to keep him company.
Grasshoppers bring good luck, I think. This one I got from Jo-ann's Fabric a good while ago. It shed it's hard slick coating and is now has a grainy exterior that makes it look old.
This is the door rabbit. House rabbit. Rabbit most likely to be tripped over. I dream of creating concrete statues, hypertufa containers, mosaic fountains. One day the mood will come upon me and I won't be able to resist. Until then, I'll just take pictures of the ones I already have.