Chapter 138 Living in the Same House
As Jinhua said this, her face was full of joy.
Xia Daohua's eyes widened in disbelief, and she exchanged glances with Lihua. Both sisters felt that they could never understand Jinhua's mentality.
If what Liu said was true, how could Jinhua be so enthusiastic about pleasing her mother-in-law since she had suffered such a great loss in her husband's family?
Lihua paused and asked, "How many days will your mother-in-law's birthday be in? With so many designs, I'm really afraid I won't be able to make it in time! Otherwise, why don't you go to the embroidery workshop and hire a few embroiderers to do it!"
Jinhua's eyes turned red with grievance:
"Lihua, are you not going to help me? Don't worry, I won't ask you to do everything. Just help me embroider this one, this one, this one, and this one."
Lihua saw that the paintings that Jinhua pointed at were the ones with the most complicated patterns, and she was almost laughing at her:
“So many, or such a complicated pattern?
You think too highly of me!
Even if I work day and night, it will take me at least one or two months to embroider it. By then, I'm afraid I'll miss your mother-in-law's birthday party.
Jinhua, if you really don't want to change the pattern, you should just hire a few embroiderers.
It would be better to hire more people, otherwise I'm afraid I won't be able to catch up."
The so-called birthday gift was just an excuse. Jinhua's real goal was not the embroidery, but to keep Lihua. How could she listen to Lihua's advice?
She was embarrassed and smiled bitterly:
"My family has already spent a lot of money on my marriage, how can I shamelessly spend more money to hire an embroiderer just to please my mother-in-law?
If you're really worried about not being able to make it in time, you can either change this one, this one, and this one. It won't take more than a month, right? I can do the last few by myself.
We don't have to work day and night.
Otherwise, if there is a mistake in the embroidery, you have to take it apart and start over, which will only waste more time."
Lihua shook her head: "There are so many, and with just the two of us, we won't be able to finish embroidering them if we don't hurry."
She carefully looked through the pile of patterns and picked out two more:
"These two have auspicious meanings too, 'blessings as vast as the East Sea, longevity as great as the Southern Mountains', how appropriate! Let's use these two to replace the one about a hundred birds paying homage to the phoenix and the one about a beauty of the country!"
A Hundred Birds Paying Homage to the Phoenix means many birds are surrounding a phoenix, with hundreds of birds chirping, green feathers and red clothes, in all kinds of charming poses; The National Beauty and Heavenly Fragrance means a garden full of peonies, with the flowers in clusters, crowded together, and stacked up layer upon layer.
Both of these are complex designs that fill up the entire surface of the painting, and require the use of hundreds of colorful embroidery threads, such as the phoenix's tail feathers in "Hundred Birds Paying Homage to the Phoenix", which require the use of gold and silver threads.
Besides, although the meanings of these two are quite auspicious, they are a bit too far away from the theme of celebrating birthdays.
As for "May you be blessed with good fortune and live as long as the Southern Mountains", the composition is simple and elegant, with a large area of white space on the screen. It does not require so many colors of embroidery threads and is much simpler to embroider.
The only difference is that the colors of the picture are cold, with more blue, black and white colors used, making it far less bright, dazzling and magnificent than the previous two.
If you really want to celebrate the birthday and are in a hurry to finish the work, Lihua's suggestion is naturally reasonable.
However, Jinhua's original intention was to keep Lihua as long as possible, and the embroidery matter was just a cover. How could she agree to this obviously simpler and more efficient plan?
Jinhua shook her head repeatedly:
"No, no. Lihua, you don't know my mother-in-law. If I use this kind of embroidery pattern, I might offend her..."
Xia Daohua and Lihua couldn't help but look at each other again.
Judging from Jinhua's attitude, it is obvious that this matter is definitely not that simple.
Seeing that Jinhua was determined, Lihua stopped trying to persuade her:
"Sister Jinhua, since you have made up your mind, I can't say much. But whether you live a good life or not, the most important thing is not your mother-in-law."
Jinhua couldn't help but sneer, thinking to herself, you are still a yellow-haired girl, what do you know? !
However, she quickly restrained her expression, pretending to be very sad, and sighed: "Alas, Lihua, you don't know, my mother-in-law is not an ordinary person..."
Seeing Jinhua's attitude, Lihua said nothing more. She just asked directly:
"These pictures require quite a few colors. Do you have all the embroidery threads ready?"
Jinhua had many kinds of colorful embroidery threads at home, but they were far from enough to embroider these patterns.
However, Jinhua had not originally planned to prepare all the embroidery threads.
The main reason was that she had no idea when Dai Sanlang would come to pick her up, so she had to do her best to keep Lihua at home for a few more days.
The uneven embroidery thread can also be used as an excuse to delay time.
But she couldn't tell Lihua these words. Jinhua could only smile awkwardly and said:
“Most of them are ready, so we can start embroidering.
I'm still short of a few rare colors, and the embroidery workshops and silk shops in town don't have them either...
But I have asked my father's good friend to bring it to me from another place!
I estimate that it will arrive in about two or three days."
As Jinhua said this, she saw Lihua's pair of beautiful eyes, clear and bright, staring at her intently, without blinking for a moment, which made Jinhua break out in a cold sweat:
"Lihua, why are you looking at me like that? But is there something wrong with my face?"
Lihua shook her head and said nothing. She just sighed helplessly, lowered her head, and began to select embroidery thread from the basket that Liu had just brought.
Jinhua quietly covered her mouth with her hands and let out a light breath.
Xia Daohua saw this and felt that Jinhua's every move was becoming more and more suspicious.
She made up her mind to keep a close eye on Jinhua and find out what she was up to.
Lihua worked very efficiently and without reservation. Since she had agreed to help, she began to think seriously about how to match colors, how to divide the lines and so on.
Seeing that Lihua was preparing to embroider seriously, Jinhua didn't know what to talk about, so she also began to work on the basics - she had already started her first embroidered screen, but she had only roughly embroidered a few stitches.
Xia Daohua enthusiastically helped Lihua to divide the lines and match the colors. She was very well behaved. The two of them understood each other and cooperated naturally and tacitly.
When Jinhua and Zhu saw this, they couldn't help but reveal a bit of envy.
The women worked all afternoon, during which Xia Youcai came over once, Liu came over twice, Zhu brought them tea twice, and sent them snacks twice...
Zhu has been very busy recently because Liu fired her as the kitchen maid. When she came over, she just said hello and said a few words to her sisters, then went on with her busy work.
At other times, it was just the golden flowers, pear flowers, and rice flowers busying around in one place.
After an afternoon, Xia Daohua felt her neck was sore, her hands were numb, and her eyes were sore. She looked in the mirror and found that her eyes had become rabbit eyes.
It can be seen that embroidery, although it looks leisurely, is actually not an easy job.
That night, Lihua and Daohua lived in the same room with Jinhua.
First update.
(End of this chapter)
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