Yuan Heng's family and Yuan Fang's family each had four people. They arrived in Qingyang City on the 29th day of the twelfth lunar month, stayed at Yuan Rui's house for one night, and prepared to go to the Sun family to pay New Year's greetings together the next day.
In addition to these families, Yuan Rui also plans to bring her parents-in-law along.
Yuan Rui has two sisters-in-law, both of whom live in the city of Qingyang. They go back to their parents' home on the second day of the Lunar New Year every year, and stay at their husband's home on New Year's Eve and the first day of the New Year.
If their son and his family don’t celebrate the New Year at home, the old couple will have to celebrate the New Year alone.
The old couple of the Sun family thought that Yuan Rui's in-laws had helped a lot when their youngest son encountered difficulties, so they asked Sun Aimin to discuss with them in advance and invite them all over.
This large group of people also rented a minibus and set off early in the morning so as not to delay the driver from returning home to have a reunion dinner with his family.
It was just after nine o'clock when the group arrived at Liuwangzhuang. The Sun family was bustling with activity, with everyone in the family coming to the old couple's yard to help prepare lunch.
With so many people in the family, they didn't really need that many people helping out. In the end, they divided up the work: the eldest and second wives of Sun were responsible for selecting, washing, and chopping the vegetables. The two stoves and the furnace in the outer room were used, and the three Sun brothers were responsible for preparing different dishes. Sun Min was in charge of adding firewood to the two stoves.
Yuan Jie wanted to help her two sisters-in-law with some chores, but was stopped by them and asked to be solely responsible for coaxing the children.
The elders from both families were not allowed to get involved, so they were allowed to chat on the warm kang.
The rest of the children went out to set off firecrackers under the leadership of their eldest brother Sun Qi.
When the Yuan family arrived at the Sun family, they saw such a lively scene.
Speaking of liveliness, every household is more lively during the Chinese New Year than usual, but it is rare to see such a lively scene as the one at the Sun family today.
In the past, the Sun family always had family members together during the Chinese New Year, and it had never been as lively as it is now.
As soon as the Yuan family arrived, the scene became even more lively.
Several elderly people who were originally chatting on the kang saw the car parked at the door, got off the kang and went out to greet it, and pulled Yuan Rui's parents-in-law who had just got out of the car into the house.
It was not easy for these elderly families to get together. Yuan Rui's parents-in-law were both born and raised in Jiangjin City. They had no relatives or friends in the countryside. This was their first time to celebrate the New Year in the countryside, and they felt everything was new and familiar.
I walked through the outbuilding and into the house, and found that it was very warm, not worse than the heated houses in the city.
Sitting on the warm kang feels even more novel and comfortable.
With the arrival of this family, there were more children. As the eldest among the families, Sun Qi felt the pressure of taking care of the children was quite great.
This large group of children, big and small, soon split into several groups.
For example, several members of the Sun family have already gone to college, and there is Yuan Siyi who is in her senior year of high school, and Sun Yao who is in her freshman year. These children have a lot of common topics.
The two high school students were full of curiosity about college life and often asked their older brothers and sisters about their studies and life in college.
When it comes to college life, college students have a lot to talk about. They talk about things related to their majors, interesting things they have seen and heard at school, the local customs and culture of the city where their school is located, and various club activities.
This makes high school students envious and more eager for college life. Of course, they can also give high school students some study advice from their own perspective.
However, Yuan Siyi and Sun Yao are both top students. They are not too worried about their studies. They are more concerned about which university to set as their goal and what major to choose in the future.
The activities of the younger children were more pure, just playing, and Sun Qi suddenly became the king of the children here.
Setting off firecrackers is one of their essential activities, but for safety reasons, the firecrackers they set off are of low power and have a high safety factor.
In the past two days since returning, Sun Qi has bought a thousand yuan worth of fireworks and brought them home to set them off in the evening.
The only regret is that there was no snow around New Year’s Eve this year. In the past, setting off firecrackers after the snow on New Year’s Eve was a special kind of fun.
The children were playing, talking and laughing, and time passed quickly.
Since there were so many people at home today, we set up four large round tables. There was a kang table and a floor table in the east and west rooms respectively.
The men drank and chatted at one table, while those who didn't drink gathered around another floor table with a few older children. The women and children ate at the kang table.
All dishes were served in four plates, and several older children were responsible for delivering the dishes to each table.
Everyone enjoyed the meal to their heart's content. After all, it was the masterpiece of several master chefs. Moreover, because there were so many people, the variety of dishes was richer than when the families were celebrating the New Year separately.
That evening, everyone prepared several different dumpling fillings: leeks and eggs, lamb and green onions, pork and celery, and sauerkraut and oil. They added the fillings to several bowls, mixed them with seasonings, and then kneaded the dough and let it rest for over half an hour.
Starting around five o'clock, everyone gathered together to bustle about making dumplings, cooking the dumplings with different fillings separately. For good luck, a clean coin was randomly placed in each dumpling.
At around six o'clock, plates of plump white dumplings were served on the table, along with a few fried home-cooked dishes and two plates of cooked food with cucumber as a base as side dishes.
The dumplings of various flavors were all of moderate saltiness and fragrant. Everyone was very satisfied while eating dumplings and drinking wine or beverages.
When someone eats the coin hidden in the dumpling, they are even more surprised. This is the sign of being a "lucky person".
After dinner, the women worked together to clean the table, put peanuts, melon seeds, candies and other snacks on the table, chatted and waited for the Spring Festival Gala to begin.
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