When Su Li was about to reach the Su family, he took out two spring clothes from the space, which were for Li Ruiying and her husband. The other brothers and sisters-in-law prepared a bag of brown sugar and a bag of red dates for each family, and the children got two bags of candy, hairbands and a bag of apples.
When Su Li arrived at the door, she pushed her bicycle and knocked on it. "Dad, Mom, I'm back. Is anyone home?"
Li Ruiying was twisting the hemp rope vigorously in her hand. When she heard Su Li's voice, she put it down quickly and opened the door. The sisters-in-law in the house and the man who was trying to smooth things over stopped what they were doing.
Li Ruiying opened the door and saw Su Li pushing a bicycle and quickly stepped aside. "Why are you here today, my daughter? Are you tired? Come in and have some hot water."
Su Lan ran into the room, poured a cup of hot water with brown sugar in it, and handed it to Su Li, "Aunt, drink some sugar water and take a rest."
Others also greeted Su Li, "Sister-in-law is here, come in and sit down, it's cold outside."
"Aunt is coming"
"Auntie, I miss you"
"My sister is here, why did you bring something again?"
The people from the Su family were pouring water and moving stools, fearing that Su Li would be tired. Only Su Changshun was working proudly, but his eyes were always stealing glances at her. Su Li looked at her father, who was like a big cat waiting to be comforted, and immediately walked over happily, "Dad, I'm back. Look, your daughter has lost weight because she missed you so much." Su Li rubbed her rosy face while saying that.
Su Li was very satisfied with the work here, but she hated the wind the most. It was very strong and it felt like a knife when blowing on people's faces in winter. The faces of young girls and wives would all have high red spots.
"Hehe! Look, look, what do you think? My daughter is still the most filial. She just said she missed me."
After hearing what her husband said, Li Ruiying rolled her eyes to the sky. It turned out that this old man could be so childish.
She glanced at him and ignored him, then pulled her daughter into the main room.
Su Changshun put down the iron pole in his hand and followed behind with his hands behind his back.
"Mom, these are two sets of spring clothes I made for you and dad. Wear them when the weather gets warmer. There are also brown sugar and red dates that my brother and sisters-in-law brought to nourish their bodies. Eating one or two red dates a day is good for your health. There are also candies and sweets for my nephews and nieces."
Su Li was generous in bringing so many things, and Li Ruiying simply said a few words to her. Her brother and sister-in-law looked at their sister/sister-in-law with more kindness. After all, both brown sugar and red dates were rare items, and they were reluctant to buy them, especially the red dates. Why were they so big? The bag for the red dates was also big, and it looked like it weighed at least two kilograms.
After giving the children candies and hairbands, Su Li sat down and spoke, "Dad, Mom, what's going on at home? Are you preparing to build a house?"
"It snowed so hard that two houses collapsed. Your eldest brother's house and your youngest brother's house are both dozens of years old. They have been repaired and thatched every time. Unexpectedly, one of them collapsed today. We are repairing the roof today while the weather is good."
"How did they stay at home for so many days?" Su Li looked around at everyone, "They didn't sleep on the floor, did they?"
Su Changshun: "It's okay, we can fix the broken house in the next two days, it will be warm if we squeeze in together!"
Su Li nodded and looked at Wu Yanhong who was sitting on the side with her big belly, "Fifth sister-in-law, are you going to give birth soon? Why don't you go to the hospital to wait for delivery when your belly is so big?"
Wu Yanhong really likes Su Li now. Her husband has a formal job and now has a bicycle, which is something that no one in the village has. "Why go to the hospital? I can get it at home. It will probably be ready next month. My mother has already found a mother-in-law for me. It won't be a problem."
Su Li was stunned for a moment, she had forgotten that these two children were basically raised at home. It was considered unlucky to send a child to the hospital in the countryside. Hospitals were full of white people, and the country people were very disgusted with it.
Seeing that Su Li and the fifth daughter-in-law were chatting, Li Ruiying asked several daughters-in-law to go to the kitchen to cook more local dishes. The two responded and went to the kitchen.
"Sister-in-law, make more meat dishes today! It's rare for my sister-in-law to come over, so we have to let her eat! How about adding some egg soup!"
"Hey, I'll listen to you. Our sister-in-law is really a caring person now. Look, we have received gifts during the two visits. My Sulan and Sufang are wearing cotton-padded clothes made from sister-in-law's clothes. The cotton-padded jackets given by mother-in-law are very thick. I see that the chilblains on the hands of the two girls are much lighter than before."
"Isn't it? I'm drooling just thinking about the dinner for the 30th anniversary today. I've never eaten so much meat since I was a child."
"Hahaha, don't blame you. It was me who almost scared myself to death when I saw my brother-in-law pushing his bicycle home with so much food and meat on it. Ouch! When I was eating midnight dinner, I saw such a big piece of meat and my hands were shaking when I picked up the food."
"Hahaha... look at you, you're useless."
"You're still talking about me. You forgot how wide your eyes were. You almost drooled."
......
Several women were busy making fire, steaming buns, picking vegetables and cooking. It was very lively.
The old couple of the Su family and several brothers except Su Huai were all in the main room. Wu Yanhong was sitting with her stomach hunched over, so Su Li asked her to go back to her room to rest.
"Girl, do you have something to say?" Li Ruiying asked.
"Dad, Mom, let's put aside the roof repairs for now. I have something to discuss with you."
When they heard that Su Li was in trouble, the Su brothers looked at her seriously. Even Li Ruiying and her husband were nervous, fearing that something had happened to her.
"Dad, Mom, brothers, don't be nervous. This is not my fault. This is what happened. Zhengchuan is now working at the county police station. A comrade-in-arms has a batch of black tiles. I want to ask if you want to build a house. We can't build a brick house, but we can build an adobe house with black tiles on the roof. But I don't know how much it will cost to build a house, so I came to ask what you think."
The Su family didn't expect such a thing to happen. Their house really needed to be renovated. They had lived in it for too long, and the thatch sometimes leaked, especially during the rainy season.
But there are so many people in the family, if they really want to build a house, they have to consider whether to build a few more rooms. The boys in the family will get married when they grow up, and they must have their own room. However, they have no money, and Su Huai is the only one in the family who has a salary, so how can they afford to buy a house?
The eldest brother of the Su family said, "Sister, you know the situation at home. Although we have a lot of laborers, we also have a lot of people. After a little labor, there is not much left to supplement the income. The remaining money has to be used to buy food."
"Yes! Sister, tell your brother-in-law that this is a small matter. Thank him. It's just that our family can't afford to build a house."
"It's okay. We can just fix up our house and move in. Don't worry, so many people are here."
The brothers were afraid that Su Li would worry about them, so they took turns saying that they were strong and healthy and would not get sick if they slept on the floor.
Su Changshun lowered his head and thought for a while before saying, "How much money does the old lady have at home?"
Li Ruiying knew that her husband wanted to build a house. How could her children not feel distressed? The family conditions were not good, but this old house could no longer be lived in. Several elderly people in the village had frozen to death this day. If her daughter had not given the family so many clothes, cotton wool, food and daily necessities this day, even if no one in her family had frozen to death, someone would have gotten sick.
What's more, Lao Wu's wife was pregnant. When she knew that the house had collapsed, she was so scared that she almost fainted. She was afraid that it was Lao Wu's house. If such a thick earthen wall hit Lao Wu's wife's belly, it would be a double death.
Black tiles are such a rare thing, so she also wanted to buy them. It was a rare opportunity, so she would buy them even if it was just to build one or two rooms.
He took all the money from the cabinet, walked to the main room, looked at everyone and said, "The labor of these brothers and sisters, the salary of the fifth brother, plus the 500 yuan given by your younger sister, but at that time, the family bought a lot of cloth and cotton wool for you to make clothes, so the rest of the money is 975 yuan."
Su Changshun: "It's not enough to build a room with the whole house, but it should be about the same if we build a smaller one, but we can't buy black tiles."
"Dad, it's okay. Don't build our third room. The house I built when I got married was only a few square meters. Is it habitable?"
"We don't need to raise money for the fourth room, we can just raise money for the eldest and second brothers. Their house is several dozen square meters old and it's the house where my parents lived. We can't live there anymore."
"That's right! Dad!"
"That's not possible. How can the elder brother live in the old house and the younger brother live in the old house? That's not possible."
"Brother is right. I don't agree! I won't stop even if you get up."
......
Su Li looked at their modest expressions and smiled, "Don't worry, the tile issue can be solved as soon as possible. The boys in the family are growing up and need to live separately from the girls. Big brother, we must build a new house. We all live in a new house. I just received 2,000 yuan in royalties. I will give 1,500 yuan to build a house for our family. It should be bigger and more spacious. It will be enough. There is still 500 yuan for buying new things."
As he spoke, he took out two thousand yuan and several stacks of big unity notes from his bag. The people in the Su family were stunned for a moment and did not react for a long time.
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