Qiu Yuling was both amused and confused. Her grandmother was so blindly confident in herself!
The two of them sat around the fire, chatting while waiting for Wanjin. After a few words, Wanjin called out at the door, "Come on, come on! Don't shout so loudly at night!"
Qiu Yuling trotted in, let her dog in, locked the door from the inside, and then turned off the lights and went to bed with the old lady.
The next day she went to school and came home as usual, following the routine.
When Li Qingmei arrived, she didn't look at anyone. "Mom, isn't Yuling back yet?"
"She's here. Before she left this morning, she told me she had a test today and would be back from school late." The old lady cut the chives planted in the house by the roots, planning to make chive dumplings to eat today.
Li Qingmei carried the kang felt and kang mat into the house, stood against the wall, washed her hands, and planned to help her mother.
"I've done this little work. Sit there, have a drink of hot water, and take a rest." No matter how old you are, as long as your mother is there, you will have a place to lean your back.
Li Qingmei said she wasn't tired, replaced the old lady, and started kneading the dough. "Mom, how did Yuling do on the exam? Did you tell me?"
"No, it must be fine. What can I do if it's not?" The old lady thought about wiping the dust off the kang mat and wet the cloth, only to find that it was still rolled up and tied.
"Mom, it's big and heavy. Please wait a moment. I'll roll out the noodles and come back when you wake up." Li Qingmei had strong hands, so kneading the dough was no problem for her. In no time, she moved the upper basin over to spread the mat and felt.
"Mom, the kang is almost dry. Let's put it up today and warm it up. Don't sleep on it tonight. After a night, if there are no problems, we can move to this room. The main room above can be locked."
"I'll ask Yuling when she comes back. The kid is still studying upstairs. Will it affect her if we disturb the house?"
"This room is warm and cozy. She can study right away with the table on the kang. If she were alone in that cold room, she would freeze to death."
"Don't worry, the kid has his own ideas, just listen to him."
Li Qingmei shut up. This kid isn't grown up yet, but he's not under his mother's control.
She washed her hands again, divided the dough into small pieces, rolled them into long strips, and without cutting them with a knife, she put her thumb and middle finger together, and moved her hands quickly, pinching the dough into small lumps. She sprinkled some corn flour on them, flattened them with her palms, and stacked them together. She could roll out six or seven dumpling skins at a time.
When Qiu Yuling entered the room, the dumplings had already been wrapped and placed on the steamer to be steamed.
"Mom, you're here. Have my dad and the others gone down the canal? How is my sister-in-law these days?"
Qiu Yuling put down her schoolbag, washed her hands and started eating. There was one pot of steamed dumplings and one pot of boiled dumplings. She felt that each had its own flavor and was delicious.
"That's enough, Mom. Stop giving me food. You and my grandma can eat more." Li Qingmei kept giving her dumplings, and she quickly spread her five fingers to protect the bowl.
"You've lost weight, why don't you eat properly?" Li Qingmei stopped when she saw her blocking the bowl.
"Everyone knows how full their stomach is. Just eat yours." The old lady always took only her own food. She would rather leave the extra food on the plate than persuade Qiu Yuling to have more rice. It was useless to persuade her. Last time, she let the child eat one more bite and almost made her vomit out everything in her stomach.
"I don't know who this girl takes after." There are times when she can't eat.
Qiu Yuling is not the kind of person who wipes her mouth after eating. Since she stopped going to evening self-study, she has been the one who rushes to feed the chickens and dogs on weekdays.
Today, Qiu's mother was here, and she snatched the bran winnowing basket from Qiu Yuling's hand, saying, "Go study hard, I'll take care of all these chores."
She had no choice but to put on a hot water bottle and a big cotton hat and go into the house to do her homework.
"Mom, Yuling is sitting there without moving. Will she be cold?" This kid really makes her uneasy in every way.
"The baby is wearing thick clothes, and she said it's too warm, so she feels sleepy and wants to sleep easily."
The old lady asked Qiu's mother to come and help her with the stitches. She had to sew the two sheets together to put them on the kang, otherwise someone's butt would get pricked, and she would have to spread the sheets out every day.
By the light of the kerosene lamp, the old lady sewed the bed sheet in a short time. She put a little extra on the bed and tucked it in from the edge, making it look neat and beautiful.
After finishing, she took out another package from the cabinet. When she opened it, she found a long cloth sheet one meter wide, which was placed on the edge of the kang.
Li Qingmei touched her mother's work, which was all sewing together with scraps of cloth. "Mom's work is comparable to what the tailors at the supply and marketing cooperative do with their sewing machines. Our Duo'er has a ticket for sewing machines, but the problem is that there's no stock even in the county, so it's useless to just keep it."
"Then you should convert it into money for the kid. Don't be so unreasonable. The donkey is used by your whole family."
Li Qingmei was about to retort that the money was gone once it was given, and the things she bought were big items for the family, but her mother ruthlessly punctured her words.
"Give it to her. I'll go back and ask her. Should I let Dashan find a way to go to the market this year, or should I give her money? But if I give her money, the ticket will have to be sold at a discount first. Forget it, I'll go back and ask the kids."
Li Qingmei talked on and on, and the old lady did not interrupt. Everyone took care of themselves, and she only occasionally said a few words. The eldest daughter was already the mother-in-law's wife, and she had her own rules for living.
Qiu Yuling was keeping track of the time. She came out as soon as it was ten o'clock. She had already washed up in the cabin and now she just washed her face symbolically.
After taking off my shoes, I crawled into bed and sighed, "A warm kang is still comfortable!"
"Of course not. Didn't your fourth aunt say in her letter that there's a fire wall over in Yi City? Both rooms are warm and more comfortable."
Firewall? In the future, if she gets a job and becomes independent for a long time, we can consider arranging it, but that will be a long time in the future.
As soon as Qiu Yuling got on the kang, Li Qingmei turned off the kerosene lamp and didn't say a word until she went to school the next day, then she came out of the dark room carrying a sack of grain.
"Mom, Jianshe and I have discussed that we will send the new grain over on time to store it, and then carry the old grain back to eat. We will save it for emergencies." Frightened by the disasters in the past two years, even the old lady did not feel anything wrong.
Back in the days of the communal dining system, people would even jump down to check the cellar and not leave a single grain of rice at home. Later, when we couldn't get enough to eat, we really couldn't get any help from anyone, whether it was crying out to heaven or the earth.
"Just make your own plans and don't make any mistakes."
"How is that possible? I always leave the village before dawn and come back in the dark. I can count the number of times I have to travel so early in the morning." Li Qingmei was more cautious than anyone else in this regard.
Her daughter and mother are here, along with the elderly, weak and young, so she doesn't dare to show off and attract attention.
"Well, mother, I'm back. Next time, ask Dashan to deliver affordable coal. We have firewood, so we won't need that much. Tell Yuling to focus on her studies and not worry about these things."
The old lady nodded in agreement and waited until the people had gone far away before she came back and locked the door.
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