Lin Shi's wife quietly told her that Lin Sanzhu earned more than 40 Wen every day.
She also asked her whether her brother-in-law's wages were collected by her mother-in-law, or whether they had saved their own money for their third house.
In the end, Lin Shi's wife asked her to be more careful and not to happily count the money for them after being sold to the third house. She said that her mother-in-law was partial to her brother-in-law, and asked her to find a chance to have a good fight with the third house. , don’t just swallow your anger.
Zhou didn't answer. She was not a fool. She could still tell the difference between this kind of instigation that clearly wanted to make her family uneasy.
Not to mention that her father-in-law had already said that Sanfang had to figure out all the expenses for Gouzi's schooling. She had nothing to say because her brother-in-law's hands were always empty when he came home every day.
Just like yesterday, my brother-in-law actually bought white flour and pork, saying he was making buns for the family to eat, as well as two kilograms of tube bones from the day before yesterday, and a large bag of peanut cakes from the day before yesterday.
Didn't you notice that during this period, the children's faces started to turn red?
Especially her family, Yuan Huai, has a rounder face.
Thinking of the way Lin Shi's wife talked to Mrs. Zhang about everything, Mrs. Zhou felt that it would be better for her to pay less attention to her in the future.
"Third brother and sister, second sister-in-law wants to ask you something." Mrs. Liu couldn't help but speak.
Seeing the discomfort on the other person's face, Feng was a little confused, "What's the matter?"
"Third brother and sister, can you teach me how to do embroidery?" After saying this, Mrs. Liu blushed a little. This is a craft that can make money, and it is not easy to teach outsiders.
Feng was stunned after hearing this. Looking at Zhou next to him, he also looked like he wanted to learn but was too embarrassed to speak.
Feng couldn't help laughing and said, "I'm so nervous. I thought I was going to say something big. If you want to learn embroidery, just say so. This is just an ordinary embroidery technique. As long as you don't dislike it, I will naturally do it." teach."
Mrs. Liu was overjoyed, "Really? That's great. I'll buy embroidery thread and come back tomorrow!"
"Is this true or false?" Mrs. Feng turned to Mrs. Zhou and said, "If my sister-in-law wants to learn, I will teach you."
Zhou shook his head, "My hands are as thick as a whetstone, so don't roughen the thread."
"This is easy to do. Just apply pig pancreas oil on it. I have it in my room. Sanzhu bought it this time. It's not expensive, only two cents a box. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to do embroidery with my hands. "
Feng said as she handed her hand to Zhou to see.
Chunmei and Chunxiu walked out of Wu's room, "Third Aunt, we also want to learn embroidery from you!"
Chunmei is twelve years old and is the daughter of the Zhou family. Chunxiu is ten years old and is the daughter of the Liu family.
The two little girls were urged to come out by Mrs. Wu, who was urging and scolding them at the same time. These two silly girls are embroidery skills. If they learn how to do it, they will be able to straighten their backs a lot when they marry into their husband's family in the future.
When Feng heard this, she was naturally unambiguous. She waved her hand and said, "Teach, teach, teach, teach them all. Let Chunyan and Chuncao learn with the two sisters tomorrow!"
At this time, Chun Yan and Chuncao, who were nesting on the kang and playing with the rope, did not know that starting from tomorrow, their little days of "eating, drinking and having fun" would be over.
…
Today's temperature has dropped a bit again. It's the twelfth lunar month, so it's not normal for people not to freeze.
It was almost Shen hour, and there were far fewer pedestrians on the street.
In Wentang Bookstore.
Shopkeeper Gao was flipping through the calendar, counting down the days of the academy's holidays.
Most of their bookstore's business depends on the students in the college. When the college is on holiday, it will definitely be a lot cooler. Shopkeeper Gao is going to take advantage of this gap to take a good inventory of the goods in the warehouse.
The store clerk was not idle either. After going to the back hall to get a broom, he was ready to sweep the door of the store. This is something that must be done before the store closes every day.
So when Lin Sanzhu saw this scene, he couldn't help but feel a little lucky. Fortunately, the dock had finished work earlier today, otherwise he would have to wait until the store closed tomorrow.
Shopkeeper Gao was a little surprised when he saw Lin Sanzhu. He thought the price of the inkstone last time had put this person off, but he didn't expect him to come again.
However, I don’t know if I came here today to buy an inkstone.
Lin Sanzhu dug and dug. Before going out this morning, he put two slings of money on his body. He was worried that it would accidentally fall out when carrying the sack. He even wrapped it with a cloth tape, so it was more difficult to hold it now.
"Shopkeeper, is the palm-sized inkstone still there from last time?"
Lin Sanzhu, who finally took out his money bag, felt a little uneasy, but he had finally saved enough two hundred coins, and the inkstone of two hundred coins flew away.
He had asked that day, and none of the remaining inkstones cost less than 200 yuan.
What is an inkstone as big as a palm? Shopkeeper Gao couldn't help but laugh. It was obviously a Sizhou stone inkstone.
What shopkeeper Gao didn't know was that the fact that a palm-sized stone was sold for 200 yuan had already been deeply imprinted on Lin Sanzhu's heart. For him, the sacks he had been carrying these days were obviously sacks. Is it an inkstone?
After buying the inkstone, Lin Sanzhu was not in a hurry to go home. It was still half an hour before the bullock cart returned to the village. He wanted to take advantage of this time to go to the butcher stall to buy some pork and big bones, as well as fried peanuts and melon seeds. Lin Sanzhu was also prepared to weigh in some.
It's a very gloomy day. Maybe there will be heavy snow tomorrow and the roads will be blocked. If we want to come back to the town again, we don't know when.
Thinking like this, Lin Sanzhu bought two more fish. In a few days, there will be a family banquet, and there must be one or two dishes that can be served on the table.
…
Chapter 17 Family Banquet
It's snowing outside.
Lard is boiling in the kitchen pot.
This meat was bought by Lin Sanzhu from the town that day. Zhou cut the fat meat into small uniform pieces, then added a ladle of water to the pot, and the lard produced was guaranteed to be white and delicate.
As for the remaining part with streaks, it is naturally the most suitable for cooking braised pork. Using the hot pot that has just been boiled with oil, Zhou poured all the meat into the pot and stir-fried until the meat surface was browned. Then grab a few star anise and cinnamon inside, then add soy sauce, salt, and water, then cover the pot and simmer on low heat for two quarters of an hour, and finally turn the pot on high, so that a large bowl of braised pork with attractive color is ready. it is done.
Smelling the delicious aroma of meat, Mrs. Zhou was proud of herself, but she couldn't help but feel a little emotional. She said, "I can't stand the practice of doing anything." No, since my brother-in-law came back from buying meat for several days in a row, The more opportunities I have to try my hand at cooking, the more I can develop my cooking skills.
Seeing that the braised pork had been cooked, Mrs. Liu hurriedly went to her mother-in-law's room to get the straw basket. After carefully putting the clay pot containing the meat in, she took the straw basket back to the heated Kang in the main room. .
The straw basket keeps the food warm and the hot kang underneath ensures that it will still be warm when the meal is served and the food is served outside.
Today is the day when the Lin clan holds a family banquet.
Although the banquet is scheduled to start next time, the food on the table must be prepared early.
Therefore, just after breakfast, the three sisters-in-law were already busy in the kitchen.
Boil the oil, cook the meat, make the omelette, add a large bowl of tofu and a bowl of radish stewed with big bones, and later cook the whole fish, so you have six dishes.
Mrs. Wu rarely scooped out three kilograms of rice and ordered Ms. Zhou to soak it in warm water first, then put it in a pot to steam.
Mrs. Zhou nodded in agreement and said to herself, "Today we have both fish and meat, so the children in the family will be happy."
She raised her head and looked at the sky. It was still a little early before the banquet started. At this moment, except for the two fish that had not yet been put away, several other dishes were almost ready. Then she took off her apron and put it on the stove. As soon as I sat next to him, I talked to Feng and Liu about the stitching techniques of embroidery.
This is what Zhou often does these days.
Since she started learning embroidery, she has devoted herself to it. Apart from eating, sleeping and doing housework, she spends the rest of the day practicing embroidery stitches.
In Feng's words, that is, the sister-in-law is the most diligent in learning among these people.
Logically speaking, according to Zhou's practice of practicing as soon as possible, you should be able to get started quickly.
Unexpectedly, after many days in a row, even beginners Chunmei and Chunxiu were able to embroider simple flowers and leaves, but Zhou was still having headaches in several basic stitches, either rolling the thread or tying knots. , and kept getting pricked by embroidery needles.
No, after a few days, the fingers holding the embroidered cloth were pricked with no less than twenty or thirty needle holes. Oops, it hurt her to death.
Mrs. Zhou really couldn't understand why there was such a big difference between holding an embroidery needle and holding a sewing needle. Aren't you pretty good at mending clothes by yourself?
If it were normal, Ms. Zhou would have thrown away the embroidery cloth and wouldn't bother anymore.
But now, she is eager to save some money for a private house.
During this period, the news of her eldest son's marriage was weighing on Zhou's heart like a weight, making her a little breathless. Almost every time she had free time, she would mentally estimate the various expenses for the marriage. , thank the matchmaker, give gifts, make an appointment, betrothal gifts, and other expenses.
But no matter how much Zhou calculated, he could not avoid this being a terrifying expense.
In fact, if it were another family that was a little better off, these wouldn't be a big deal.
After all, the family was still too poor and troubled.
Although country people don't pay attention to the three books and six etiquette of wealthy families, they still need to pay the due betrothal gifts.
The day before yesterday, Mrs. Zhou specifically asked Guiziniang about their family’s gift of gifts to the girl. Guiziniang told her that just seven kinds of cakes and eight kinds of fruits cost half a fortune, and there were also nine gifts and other things. After counting on his fingers, he found that just giving away the lottery would cost two ounces of money, which did not include the betrothal gift given to the woman later.
It’s really getting more and more headache-inducing.
Although her son said that all the expenses for the wedding would be paid by her father-in-law, Mrs. Zhou knew the situation at home very well. In her opinion, the money her parents-in-law had on hand would be enough if they had only five taels of money. Even if all the money was used by then, Even that is not enough.
What's more, Toansong is about to reach the age of proposing marriage. As an aunt, she can't just focus on her son.
It’s no wonder that Mrs. Zhou is so anxious. Nowadays, most boys are fifteen years old when they plan to get married. After the marriage is set, they will marry a wife in two years.
This kind of approach has long been accepted as the norm in everyone's mind. If any company is different, it will be weird.
For example, Guizi has been criticized for all kinds of things in the past two years because she delayed getting married until she was seventeen.
Some said Guizi was too stupid to get married, others said it was because Gui Zi's mother was too stingy, and some even said that Gui Zi was probably not good enough. She was so angry that Gui Zi's mother went to the door of the house and scolded her for three days.
Mrs. Zhou knew that the reason why Guizi could not get married in the first two years was because her family was poor.
But now, my family's financial situation is not as good as that of Guizi's family.
So can she not be anxious?
This is also the reason why Zhou worked so hard to learn embroidery.
If she succeeds in learning, then she can try to do some embroidery work and sell it in the town. No matter how much she can earn, even if it is only four or five cents, she can accumulate a little and make a lot of money, and she can put it to some use later.
"Sister-in-law, why don't you let me pickle the fish later? Look at the needle holes all over your fingers. I don't know if they are pickled fish or pickled pig's trotters!"
After saying that, Feng couldn't help laughing.
Mrs. Liu on the side also followed suit.
Zhou rolled her eyes, "Why are you laughing? There's nothing funny about it. I don't believe you two didn't poke your hands when you took the needle."
Feng was dissatisfied, "But how can we be so ruthless as sister-in-law? Oh, this is all my own flesh. Sister-in-law, you are so ruthless, hahaha..."
Mrs. Liu nodded like a fool, "Yes, yes, sister-in-law, you are too cruel to yourself, oh, my belly, hahahaha..."
Thinking of the injection, Ms. Zhou jumped and jumped in pain, Ms. Liu and Ms. Feng laughed so hard that they burst into tears.
Seeing her two sisters-in-law holding their stomachs and rolling to the ground laughing, Mrs. Zhou rolled up her sleeves and scratched their armpits.
Of course Feng and Liu were ticklish, so they dodged left and right. The small bench they were sitting on flipped back, and the three sisters-in-law immediately rolled into a ball.
Behind the bench were piles of broken straw that could ignite the fire. At this moment, the Zhou family, the Liu family, and the Feng family all turned into cats.
Third sister-in-law, you look at me, I look at you, and you can't help laughing.
