Traveling through the mountains and farming

Lin Wan, who stayed at home, was not idle, but was thinking about how to tidy up the backyard.

Yesterday, the two little ones had cleaned up the house and the front yard, leaving only the overgrown backyard.

The weeds in the backyard were tall and dense, and Lin Wan was worried that there might be snakes and insects hiding among them.

Therefore, when she was cleaning yesterday and hadn’t gotten the snake and insect repellent powder yet, she specifically told her two children not to go to the backyard.

She carefully surveyed the wasteland in the backyard and had a preliminary plan in mind. Since stevia was growing in the southeast corner, she planned to expand outward along the stevia and make it into a wild flower bed.

Wild flower beds can be planted with perilla, wild onion, mint, wild chrysanthemum, etc. that can be dug in the wild. In addition, there are also Houttuynia cordata, small thistle with hemostatic effect, wild wolfberry and honeysuckle.

These plants have certain ornamental, edible and medicinal values. They are not only beautiful but also can hide stevia and are also of practical significance.

Then she planned to mark out a piece of land to the west and north of the wild flower bed and turn it into a vegetable garden. She would then go to the market to buy some vegetable seeds and plant some common vegetables.

She had just checked the soil carefully. The soil here was pretty good. She would then make the soil of this vegetable garden further fertile by using compost. Even though she was not good at growing vegetables, she should still be able to achieve self-sufficiency.

In this way, the wild flower and vegetable garden uses all the land on the east side of the backyard, and then a small path leading to the back mountain is reserved in the middle of the backyard, and the west side is used as a drying area and reserved activity area.

Lin Wan looked up at the sun, then turned around and went back into the house. She took out a barely usable old linen cloth from her bag and wrapped her head and face, leaving only a pair of eyes exposed. She didn't care whether it was hot or not. She just felt that her face would be horrible if it continued to be exposed to the sun.

After completing the prep work, she began weeding in the southeast corner where the stevia was.

When she came across wild vegetables, she would pick them and put them together. For beautiful wild flowers and plants with medicinal value that she could identify, she would pull them out with their roots intact, classify them and place them in a pile. Other plants that she didn't recognize would be pulled out as weeds.

During the intermission, she looked at the results of her labor that she had just obtained with great effort: she had just pulled out one-third of the weeds on the east side of the backyard.

I couldn't help but feel melancholy. Why was there still so much grass?

She felt her head was spinning.

At this time, Li Ke ran over from the front yard with a wooden barrel in his arms and shouted:

"Sister-in-law, we are back. There are more fish in the fish basket today than yesterday!"

When she saw Lin Wan's head that was wrapped up with only a pair of eyes exposed, she was suddenly stunned and forgot what she was doing there. She stood there in a daze for a while before she said, "Sister-in-law, what are you doing?"

"Oh, you mean my face? This is for sun protection, to avoid sunburn and tanning." Lin Wan explained with a smile.

Li Ke continued, "Oh, I will also use sunscreen in the future. Sister-in-law, let me tell you, my brother and I picked a lot of guava by the creek, half a basket full!"

The beauty-loving little girl decided to emulate her elder sister-in-law, while also continuing to share her and her brother's gains.

At this time, Li Chongle, who was putting things away in the outer courtyard, also came over. After seeing Lin Wan, he asked, "Sister-in-law, we have picked fruits and placed them in the yard. Do you want to dig out the seeds and dry them now?"

When he entered the backyard, he saw that his sister-in-law had pulled out a lot of grass, and there were some wild flowers and weeds neatly sorted and piled up next to her. He didn't find his sister-in-law's new look strange, because in his mind, whatever his sister-in-law did was right.

What he was more worried about was his sister-in-law's health. She almost died yesterday. She hoped she wouldn't get too exhausted again.

Then he immediately said, "Sister-in-law, it's almost noon and the sun is at its hottest. You should go inside and have a rest. I'll pull the weeds this afternoon."

Then he continued, "And I'll get some freshly picked fruits later and dry them in the hot sun."

Before Lin Wan could speak, he continued, "Let Xiao Ke cook the porridge, and we'll have kudzu porridge at noon. Is that okay?"

He arranged the rest of the things in a very clear manner.

Lin Wan also realized that the little guy wanted her to have a good rest. She was indeed a little exhausted and had originally planned to rest at noon, so she went along with it.

She smiled and said, "Okay, I'll process the fish you just brought back first. We'll put some fish and freshly picked wild vegetables in the porridge. This way, the nutrition will be balanced and we'll have enough energy to pull weeds in the afternoon."

Lin Wan took the flowers and plants that she had just arranged to plant in the flower bed to a shady place, and waited until it was cooler in the afternoon to plant them in the flower bed. The two siblings took the initiative to follow her to help.

Afterwards, the three of them followed Li Chongle's instructions, finished their assigned tasks, and had a delicious lunch together.

After dinner, Lin Wan pulled the two children to take a nap together. Li Chongle was very embarrassed and said that he was afraid of the heat during the day. He brought some straw and said he wanted to sleep on the floor.

~

Summer afternoon.

The sound of cicadas chirping can be heard one after another.

Lin Wan took a nap. After waking up, she got out of bed quietly without disturbing the two siblings who were still sleeping in the room. She went out quietly and went to the backyard to see the ice powder seeds drying.

She first came to the first batch of ice jelly seeds drying in the winnowing baskets, squatted down, and gently pinched the ice jelly seeds on the winnowing baskets with her hands. Then she checked the second batch of ice jelly seeds in the same way. Then she planned to collect the ice jelly that had already dried in the first winnowing basket.

Just as she picked up the dustpan, Li Chongle's voice came from behind: "Sister-in-law, is it ready to dry?"

"Well, the first batch is ready. The next batch you are going to dry will need to be dried for a while longer." Lin Wan responded while continuing to hold the dustpan and prepare to go into the house.

At this time, Li Chongle immediately stepped forward to lend a hand, and the two of them carried the dustpan in together.

Lin Wan felt that the dustpan was not heavy, but she couldn't stop this warm-hearted boy from insisting on helping her.

She told Li Chongle to collect the ice jelly seeds in the winnowing basket, and she picked up the wooden barrel next to her, went out to get a small half bucket of mountain spring water, and prepared to make ice jelly.

Everything is ready, except for the gauze to hold the ice powder seeds.

She stopped and thought about whether there was anything at home that could be used to replace the gauze. After a while, she remembered that the half bucket of rice that Aunt Li had given her was in a burlap bag. She immediately ran to the room, emptied the bag, washed it, and put the ice powder seeds in it.

Li Ke, who was still taking a nap at this time, was awakened by the noise made by Lin Wan and Li Chongle. When she got up, she happened to catch Lin Wan starting to knead the ice jelly.

As soon as she arrived at the kitchen, she saw Lin Wan placing a cloth bag of ice powder seeds in a wooden barrel filled with water and rubbing, squeezing, and rubbing them repeatedly.

She walked closer and looked carefully. She could see a sticky transparent substance oozing out from the edge of the cloth bag. When the transparent substance stopped oozing out, Lin Wan stopped rubbing and took out the cloth bag.

"Is this okay? Can I try it first?" she asked with sparkling eyes, eager to try.

"Not yet. You can't eat it until it solidifies. You can pick some stevia and boil some sugar water. You will need it when you eat this later." Lin Wan touched Li Ke's head and answered with a smile.

Li Chongle, who was watching the whole process, knew that he would have to wait for a while before he could eat. He didn't want to just wait there, so he turned to Lin Wan and said that he wanted to go to the backyard to pull weeds.

Before leaving, he specifically asked Lin Wan if there was anything she needed to pay attention to when pulling out the weeds, because he had seen before that she did not pull out all the weeds, but instead pulled out some of the flowers and plants and left them behind.

Lin Wan took the same sun protection measures as she did in the morning before going to the backyard with Li Chongle to continue weeding.

Even though Li Chongle is only nine years old, which is still an elementary school student in modern times, he can do the work as well as half an adult in the village, and someone like Lin Wan can do the work of an entire adult.

At the same time, Lin Wan felt that Li Chongle's caring level was comparable to that of an adult.

Because the little boy squatting in front of her pulling weeds would look back at her every once in a while. As long as he noticed that she was a little exhausted, he would stop, take her to the shade to rest, and considerately hand her a glass of water.

Of course, another thoughtful little cutie Li Ke was also present. After cooking the sugar water, she joined the weeding team and followed behind, mainly pulling out some short and easy-to-pull weeds.

At about four o'clock in the afternoon modern time, the three of them finally pulled out all the grass on the east side. Lin Wan asked the two siblings to stop for a halftime break because their jelly was ready to eat.