Yu Yang smiled and agreed, "Okay, I'll talk to Grandpa, that way he won't have to spend money to buy it, and he can save a lot of money."

Chen Hong was also pleased with her son's thoughtfulness and filial piety: "Good son, he knows how to save money for his grandfather. He is a good child who knows how to manage money."

After finishing their meal, washing the dishes and cleaning the kitchen, Chen Hong led her son, wearing raincoats and carrying baskets, to the backyard to pick vegetables.

"Son, don't go into the vegetable garden. The rain has soaked the ground, and you'll step into a muddy rut. It'll be hard to pull your feet out. Mom will pick vegetables, and you go feed the chickens and ducks."

Yu Yang glanced at the deep footprints in the vegetable garden, then readily agreed and went to feed the chickens and ducks.

The vegetables couldn't be stored properly after the rain, so Chen Hong only picked 1-2 jin of each kind of vegetable. Even so, the basket still weighed more than 10 jin, enough for Grandpa Yu Yang to eat for two or three days.

Chen Hong decided to pick more vegetables for him when the weather was nicer, such as green beans, string beans, eggplants, and peppers. The old man had nothing to do at home, so she let him dry the vegetables himself.

After picking the vegetables and washing her hands, Chen Hong packed 30 eggs and 20 salted duck eggs into a plastic bag, locked the door, changed into her rain boots, and the mother and daughter carried the things to the old house.

After putting down the vegetables and leaving the child behind, Chen Hong carried the basket home.

I went inside and looked at the sky. The rain was falling steadily, neither too fast nor too slow, and it looked like it wouldn't stop anytime soon.

Chen Hong locked the front door, went back inside to wash her hands, brought out a large plastic bucket and a siphon tube, washed them clean, disinfected them with white wine, wrapped both ends of the siphon tube with clean fine gauze, and sucked the wine from the vat into the plastic bucket, which just filled two 100-jin buckets.

Finally, seal the bucket opening with plastic wrap, and then poke small holes in the plastic wrap for ventilation. After two days, once the secondary fermentation and sedimentation are complete, it can be bottled and stored in a cellar.

No one visits each other on rainy days; people in rural areas usually stay home to rest and sleep on rainy days. Chen Hong locked the front door, went back to the bathroom, and entered her spatial dimension.

We can't work outside, but we're not affected by the weather inside, so there's still plenty of work to be done! First, start the hand-held tractor, attach the rotary tiller, and plow the land.

Apart from the reserved pits and depressions along the riverbank for planting trees, there are only about 10 mu of arable land left. Last time, 2 mu were cultivated and 3 fen of crops were planted. Chen Hong finished cultivating the remaining 8 mu in one go.

My arms were numb from the shaking. I was exhausted and hungry, so I left the space, went to the kitchen, steamed two buns, and made a tomato and egg soup. After eating and drinking my fill, I collapsed on the sofa to rest.

I checked the weather forecast on my phone. The rain will stop between 4 and 9 pm, but it will rain from 9 pm until tomorrow.

The rain would stop in an hour, so Chen Hong brewed a cup of tea and slowly sipped it to aid digestion, enjoying this rare moment of leisure. Outside the window, a light rain pattered down, and the distant mountains appeared small and dreamlike in the hazy mist, like a landscape painting with profound artistic conception.

The small fishing village was now free of the sounds of car horns and speeding by. The rain had washed the leaves, making them a vibrant green and the air incredibly clean.

Driving on the highway after the rain, Chen Hong felt very relaxed. The houses and roads that flashed by were all clean and tidy!

Chen Hong went to the county's express delivery point to pick up a truck full of goods, and quickly drove away under the curious gaze of the staff.

Upon exiting the county town and observing that there were no vehicles or pedestrians in sight, Chen Hong immediately stopped the car, put her belongings into her storage space, and started the car to go home.

I made a batch of dough, and I'll steam some buns and dumplings for dinner tonight. We've almost finished the dumplings from last time, so I need to prepare some more dry food to freeze. That way, when we go out to sea, we can just take them out and steam them – convenient and easy.

I went to the backyard to feed the chickens and ducks, collect eggs and pick vegetables, and then went back to the kitchen to pick some chives and green beans.

Today I steamed two kinds of buns: one steamer of chive, wood ear mushroom, and egg buns, and one steamer of green bean and pork buns. I also stir-fried some shredded potatoes and made a loofah and egg soup. After finishing the meal, I called my son to come home for dinner.

After dinner, the mother and son ate fruit while watching TV. After finishing the series, Chen Hong put Yu Yang to bed; there were still many fruit trees in the space waiting for Chen Hong to plant.

After a busy night, all the fruit trees were finally planted; all that was left was watering them. The next day, I slept until 8 a.m., and when I opened my eyes, I saw my son sitting on the floor playing with building blocks. "Little Bao, were you up already? Why didn't you wake Mommy?"

While building with blocks, Yu Yang said, "I played for a while, and I saw that Mom was sleeping soundly, so I didn't wake you. Mom isn't in a hurry to get up. It's raining again today, so we can't do any chores."

"No more sleep, you've had enough sleep. Get up and make breakfast, then you can play." After washing up and making breakfast, the mother and son chatted while eating: "Little Bao, are you going to Grandpa's house for lunch today? I'm not going out today, so maybe you shouldn't go. I'll make dumplings for lunch, and you can take some to Grandpa."

Yu Yang nodded: "Okay, we haven't had dumplings in a long time, Grandpa must want some too. I'll call him later and tell him not to cook lunch, I'll bring him some dumplings."

In the morning, Chen Hong tidied up every nook and cranny of the house, swept the main room, and organized the storage room. The chores were finished quickly, and Chen Hong began preparing lunch.

The mackerel she caught the day before yesterday was big and fat, so Chen Hong planned to make two kinds of dumplings: one with mackerel filling and the other with three kinds of seafood filling. She killed and cleaned the mackerel, scraped off the fish meat, chopped it into a paste, mixed it with minced meat, added Sichuan peppercorns, scallions, ginger, water, pepper powder, oyster sauce, and sesame oil, and fed it to the fish.

Peel and devein the shrimp, chop them finely, and marinate them with scallion and ginger water. Add chopped chives, chopped wood ear mushrooms, chopped eggs, oyster sauce, salt, and peanut oil, and mix well.

Chen Hong can make dumplings very quickly, thanks to her cheerful personality and good interpersonal skills when she worked as a waitress in a restaurant. She often went to the kitchen to help out and learned all kinds of kitchen work.

After wrapping the dumplings and cooking them, Chen Hong, worried that her son might burn himself, went to the old house and brought him two plates of dumplings, one of each type of filling. They could put any leftovers in the refrigerator and fry them for the next meal.

My dear reader, there's more to this chapter! Please click the next page to continue reading—even more exciting content awaits!