That evening, Danniang prepared a sumptuous dinner for everyone, and the family sat together for a long-awaited reunion meal.

After dinner, Xu Han took a shower and waited for Lu Chuan to return to her room, wanting to discuss with him the expenses for their trip to the prefectural city and the money they would earn from selling eggs.

Lu Chuan walked into the house while drying his freshly washed hair. "Why aren't you asleep yet?"

"Of course I'm waiting for you! I've been away for a few days, and I don't know if I've earned enough money to buy things. Come over here and let's calculate the total bill together."

Xu Han sat cross-legged on the bed and wrote down all the expenses of the past few days in a notebook, while Lu Chuan calculated the total bill.

After checking everything, I realized that I spent a total of 17 taels and 3 mace on sugar and other miscellaneous items, with sugar making up the majority of the cost, accounting for more than half of it.

I bought quite a few other things, but overall it wasn't a lot, since there were quite a few of each item.

Xu Han, holding the account book, said with a smile, "We made a total of 30 taels and 9 qian from selling eggs. After deducting our expenses for buying things, as well as the cost of accommodation and car rental, we not only didn't lose money on this trip to the prefectural city, but we also made 13 taels of silver. Not bad, not bad. Let's try to make more next time."

Lu Chuan also said, "Yes, it's pretty good. We still have more than 20,000 eggs at home. We can go sell them again next time we have time. We should be able to make quite a bit of money."

"That's fine. Whether we sell them in the shop later or continue to sell them in the prefectural city, they will eventually sell."

"Although it seems we made a lot of money on this trip, these eggs were collected over almost a year. If you divide them up by the day, they don't actually amount to much."

"We make about 300 eggs a day now, which isn't much. We can only earn about 300 coins a day just from eggs."

Xu Han thought about it and realized that her family didn't really have any major business right now. If they relied solely on selling eggs, they simply couldn't support so many people.

But it doesn't matter, there are still canned fruits that haven't been sold yet, plus fruit wine and other products later, so we should be able to make a small profit before the end of this year.

However, the prerequisite for making a small profit is to open a shop in the county town. Then, not only can you sell these things, but you can also sell some of the products from the mountains.

All in all, it adds up to a considerable amount of money over a year. It's more than enough to cover the daily living expenses of a family.

Xu Han said, "Tomorrow I will take them to pickle all the duck eggs we have at home into salted duck eggs. I will also pickle the remaining duck eggs in the space when they are not around."

Fresh duck eggs don't sell well; it's better to sell them as salted duck eggs.

Lu Chuan glanced at Xu Han and said, "Don't do it by yourself. Let's all do it together tonight. There's not much left. The more people there are, the faster it will pickle. If you do it by yourself, it will probably take several days to finish pickling."

"That works too. It's too late today, so let's skip it and start tomorrow night!"

After they made their decision, they realized it was getting late and blew out the lights to go to sleep.

The next day, Lu Chuan led them to work, and Xu Han led a few girls to pickle salted duck eggs.

The salted duck eggs were all pickled in a short time in the morning, so it didn't take much time.

At noon, Qi Yu, Chun Chan, Chun Mei and the others started making clothes for winter.

The rest of the people were all helping to lay bluestone slabs in the courtyard of the valley.

They did this for ten days in a row, and before they knew it, it was October. The courtyard in the valley was finally finished.

Looking around, there is a large area paved with bluestone slabs. Even if there are more fields next year, there will be no fear that there will be nowhere to dry the harvested grain.

The spot originally reserved for building a warehouse has been temporarily paved with bluestone slabs. The main reason is that there is no time to build a warehouse now, as we are about to go into the mountains to pick walnuts and other things. There is no time to build one, and we don't have any bricks or tiles to use.

Looking at the newly completed courtyard, Xu Han said, "It's great. In winter, we'll build a mud wall around the courtyard. It will be much safer to live there then, and we won't have to worry about wild animals coming at night."

Lu Chuan continued, "I told Zhang Yi and the others a while ago that they should make some adobe bricks when they have time. They can start building the wall now when there's nothing else to do in the winter."

"No rush, it can't be set up in a short time. Safety is guaranteed now, so let's take it easy for now and focus on making their furniture first."

Madam Zhou, who was standing to the side, said, "Madam, the master made a lot of furniture for us some time ago. The most urgent things are already done. There's no rush for the rest. We can take our time to make them."

Didn't you say you were going to pick pine nuts and wild walnuts in the mountains? I figure it's about time now, so why don't we focus on the work in the mountains first?

Xu Han thought about it again and realized that was indeed the case. If they didn't pick them now, all the little animals in the mountains would probably ruin them.

Today is the second day of the tenth lunar month. In previous years, the harvest would have already been completed by this time. This year, due to the weather, the harvest has been delayed until now. If it continues any longer, we might not be able to harvest much at all.

Xu Han smiled and looked at everyone, saying, "Alright, since you have no objections, then of course I have no objections either. Let's all go into the mountains to pick wild game starting tomorrow. After we're done with this busy period, I'll have your master hunt some game for you, and I'll cook you a good meal to reward you properly."

Upon hearing this, everyone was overjoyed and didn't know what to do.

Since moving to the valley, apart from the Mid-Autumn Festival when I ate my wife's cooking, I haven't had any for a long time.

Although Dan Niang's cooking was also very delicious, she had to stay at the old house to cook for Xu Han and the others, while the meals in the valley were prepared by several women in shifts.

Although it tastes pretty good, once people have eaten something even better, they'll always crave it.

They had no shortage of meat in their daily lives, but they always felt that even though they used the same ingredients, the dishes made by Madam and Dan Niang tasted completely different and were much tastier than theirs.

The food cooked by the lady in particular has a unique flavor that is unforgettable once you've tasted it.

Now they have no shortage of shelter and clothing, and they have money in the mountains but can't spend it, so they just want the delicious food their wife makes.

So when everyone heard that Xu Han was going to cook a big meal for them, they were so happy that they wanted to jump around on the spot. But they were not children anymore, so they could only suppress their excitement and look forward to their lady showing off her culinary skills.

Upon hearing this, Li Si shouted, "Did you all hear that? We'd better work hard tomorrow so we can eat Madam's cooking as soon as possible."

Sister-in-law Li joked, "You don't even need to tell me. As soon as they heard that Madam was cooking, look how enthusiastic everyone was."