Green Beans, Two Ways

This is, surprisingly, not a recipe post.

The other night I was preparing some green beans for dinner, and the following conversation occurred:

Gabbie: Mom, what are you doing?
Me: Cooking green beans.
Gabbie: How are you cooking them?
Me: I'm steaming them.
Gabbie: Oh....that's not how I do it. I cook green beans different at my pink house.*
Me: Oh, yeah?
Gabbie: Yeah. Here's how me and my baby** make them. First we put down butter. Then we put the green beans on top. Then we sprinkle them with oatmeal. They're really delicious.
Me: Sounds that way.

At his point, she walked out of the kitchen, and I had to wipe a tear of laughter from my eye. She is just so awesome and her imagination is the best. I remember living in a world that existed almost entirely in my imagination when I was little, and I think it's fantastic that she's in that phase right now.

* Gabbie has lots of things at her "pink house," which is the place where she lives in her imagination, apparently. Her friends also have imaginary houses, including a yellow house and a purple house, and sometimes they trade, although the trading hasn't happened in a while. Often, when Gabbie sees something new, after we've explained it to her, she will say, "Oh! I have one at my pink house, too." Alternately, if there's something she doesn't like, it won't be at her pink house, or she'll do it differently at her pink house, hence the cooking of the green beans differently. I love hearing about her pink house.

**Gabbie also has an imaginary baby (sometimes two - yesterday there were two, one who was three like her and one who is 21, whose birthday was yesterday (her baby has a birthday almost every day - often a colored one, as in, "Today is my baby's blue birthday" - which stems from Gabbie's Very Pink 3rd Birthday Party). Her baby often does things differently than we do them, or her baby gets to do things that we don't let Gabbie do, as in, "My baby doesn't have to wash her hands after she goes potty."