【Quick Wear】My Years as a Mother-in-law

The boundless sea, dotted with the pure sky of blue sky and white clouds, is refreshing to look at. However, Yun Xi keenly feels that the sea breeze has become more violent in recent days, blowing constantly at people. It is indeed time to go back. The rainy season at the seaside may be coming, and they will not be able to withstand the typhoons and rainstorms.

They brought too much salt on the way back and the cart was too heavy, so it took five days to reach Lishugou Village. The 25 people who stayed behind came to greet them and introduced their masterpiece.

Li Daniu said, "Chief, we've paved the interiors of every house with blue bricks and built a stone path through the yard. We've pulled all the weeds out of the fields and gotten rid of all the bugs. In our free time, we've been going to the mountains and rivers to get a lot of wild vegetables and mushrooms. Oh, and we're going to pick pears today."

Chief Li was satisfied and said, "Daniu, you did a good job. Let's go to the ancestral hall and divide the things among us."

"I'm so tired."

Looking at the magnificent ancestral hall and the tablets inside, the Li clan members went in and kowtowed first before they began to distribute things. Each person received 100 kilograms of refined salt, 50 kilograms of dried wild vegetables, 10 kilograms of dried mushrooms and 100 kilograms of dried seafood.

Even though we had so many supplies, it was still not enough to survive the winter. Life was hard.

"Choose your houses according to the order. There are fifteen in a row, and each person can choose three. All the houses are the same." After dividing the things, Chief Li waved his hand and said, "After you move the things back, come back and we'll divide up the farm tools and kitchen utensils."

Yun Xi was troubled by the sight of so many things. She and Li Chunsheng couldn't carry them all.

Li Daniu glanced at her and said, "Third sister-in-law, please wait a moment. My second brother and I will come down to help."

"Okay, thank you, brother."

Yun Xi didn't hesitate and turned to find the clan leader. "Clan leader, my family is in the middle of the first row, and it's not comfortable living here. How about we switch places?"

Chief Li was puzzled, "Why?"

"Well, my family likes quietness."

"Okay then, let's change it."

In this way, Yun Xi's family moved to the three easternmost courtyards in the first row and lived in the one at the edge. It was about ten meters away from the main road, but the trees had been cut down.

Li Chunsheng was puzzled, "Mom, why did you choose this place?"

Yun Xi looked at him with a silly expression and whispered, "Because it's convenient. There's wasteland on the east side of this room to the main road. It will be convenient to open up the wasteland and grow vegetables and crops."

"I see, that's very thoughtful of you, Mom."

Li Meizi whispered.

"You are still young, so learn something. By the way, after the natural disaster is over, you won't be a child anymore. After you raise you for two years, I will hold a wedding for you. And then you have to give birth to some big fat boys for me." Yun Xi acted so mean that the cheeks of the two half-grown children turned red.

Before dark, the family moved into the new house and were finally able to sleep in separate rooms. He and his two children slept in the two east rooms of the main house, while Li Chunsheng and Li Meizi slept in the two west rooms of the main house. That was how it would be for now.

It's hot now, so don't worry about not having a quilt to cover yourself with. What you should worry about is that not having a bed to sleep on will harm your health.

Looks like I need to get into bed soon.

The second day after returning was not a leisurely one. In the morning, Yun Xi cooked a pot of wild vegetables for everyone. She added a few mushrooms as a luxury. The soup was delicious but not filling. After eating, she quickly took the sickle and went to work in the fields.

These seeds were distributed according to households, which was unfair after all, each household had different amounts of seeds. However, these seeds were dug out by the village chief who took eight people to An County. Other families did not go with them and did not contribute, so naturally everyone had to collect the seeds as the clan leader divided them, and there was no room for further discussion.

Therefore, Yun Xi got one-fifteenth of the land, which included more than three acres of rice, more than two acres of corn, three hundred pepper plants and three hundred peanut plants. There were originally three hundred and thirty corn and pepper plants, but thirty of each did not grow, which was considered a loss.

Yun Xi's family is the smallest, but they have as much food as other families, which is really enviable.

"Chunsheng, how long can our family of five eat with so much food?"

Li Chunsheng gave her a strange look, then realized that his stepmother was the daughter of a scholar. "One acre of rice can produce at most 500 kilograms of rice. Three and a half acres of rice should yield more than 1,600 kilograms of rice. One acre of corn can produce 200 kilograms, and two acres can produce about 450 kilograms. Chili peppers should yield about 3,000 peppers. Peanuts yield about 160 kilograms per acre. Ours can only produce a little over 10 kilograms at most."

"Not counting peppers, at the very least, we can only harvest 1,960 kilograms of grain? With less than five kilograms of grain a day, is that enough for other families to eat?" Yun Xi was shocked. Although she knew that the harvest was low in ancient times, she didn't expect it to be so low.

Li Meizi waved her hands. "No, no, there was a wheat harvest before, but not this year, so it's less."

Yun Xi glanced at her and retorted, "That's not enough. We had to pay taxes before, but now we don't have to."

Li Chunsheng said as if it was normal: "If there is not enough food, then just starve. If you really can't stand it anymore, go to the mountains and rivers to find food. Dad taught me how to hunt, I will find a way in the future."

"Chief Li, I know a way to harvest more grain and straw."

Yun Xi turned to look at the tribesmen who had arrived late and said something shocking.

"Oh? What can I do?"

Patriarch Li was worried that he had so many grandchildren that there might not be enough food.

"This method was passed down by our ancestors. I don't know why it hasn't been widely adopted. When harvesting, don't pull out the rice straw by the roots. Leave three to nine stalks of rice stalks, let them continue to grow for two more months, and then you can harvest another crop. This second crop will only yield half the first, and the taste will be average, but it's better than nothing, don't you think?"

"This is real?"

"Never heard of it."

"Will it work? Will it be a waste?"

……

Chief Li frowned and told his clansmen to calm down. "Wife Sanniu, everything you've suggested recently is correct. I'll trust you once again." He turned to the Li clansmen and said, "Everyone, listen to me. Wife Sanniu is educated, so her words are highly trustworthy. Also, it's still hot out, and we don't have any livestock or roof tiles, so there's no rush to use straw. Why not just leave it in the fields and give it a try? If it works, we could get hundreds of kilograms of grain! That's hundreds of kilograms."

Thinking about it this way, it seemed to be true, and the villagers accepted this statement calmly.

Li Daniu looked at his sister-in-law in surprise and asked, "Third sister-in-law, is there anything I should pay attention to with this regenerated rice?"

Yun Xi shook her head. "Brother, there's nothing to worry about. Just fertilize, weed, and catch insects like rice and take good care of it."

"So that's it."

Because it is regenerated rice, people don’t use sickles to harvest the rice, but instead use scissors to cut off the rice ears.

Yun Xi's family planted a lot of crops but had few laborers. She, Li Chunsheng and Li Meizi were cutting rice ears in the front and throwing them into a sack beside them, while the two younger ones were picking up the fish that had escaped the net at the back.

It took four or five days of hard work to bring all the grain home. Fortunately, the weather was sunny throughout the day, and the grain was spread out on the ground in front of the door to dry.