The Accidental Thumb

I’ve mentioned before that I have a thumb as black as night, but I’ve decided to alter that and call it my “accidental thumb” because everything that grows is completely by accident, whereas everything I want to grow, er, doesn’t.



I got some stevia plants and used our compost from this past year. I’ve put all our kitchen veggie scraps in the compost, including the squash seeds from when I scrape them out of the squash halves, old tomatoes, etc.

Captain Caffeine got me a soaker hose to water the plants since I’m so awful about watering properly, so I used that with the stevia plants.

Then within a week or so, I noticed some other plants growing up next to the stevia, and I wasn’t entirely sure they were weeds. In fact, they kind of smelled like tomatoes--you know, that green fresh smell from the stem?

I was too lazy too busy to weed, so I just left them and within a few weeks I absolutely knew they weren’t weeds.

Yes, that is a tomato plant, practically overpowering my tiny stevia plant on the far bottom right. It apparently grew from seeds in the compost.

Then next to it, lo and behold, I have even more plants. One is a squash plant, although I’m not entirely sure what kind. The others kind of look like tomatoes too but I don’t know if I know the difference between tomatoes, eggplant, or bell peppers (yes, I put the seeds for all those in my vegetable compost).

The squash is kind of taking over the yard.

So I just kept watering them!

Here’s a picture of my baby squash. It looks like some type of winter squash.

And here’s a close up of my tomatoes. I think it’s a cherry tomato plant.

Any advice from you REAL gardeners for this “accidental” gardener?