I was reborn after my cousin stole my life.

Chapter 31: Directly Praising People

After finally finishing cooking, Yuan Juan had just sat down when she heard the old hag speak, "Send a telegram back home tomorrow."

Zhou Lei picked up a piece of cabbage with his chopsticks, about to praise Yuan Juan for her cooking, when he heard this and, before he could react, asked, "Why are you sending a telegram? Mom, are you going back?"

Yuan Juan's eyes lit up.

Zhou's mother rolled her eyes at him. "Go back? What? I told you to send a telegram to your older brother to bring Xiaohua to me! Didn't I tell you I want to live here with you, help take care of your children, and let your daughter go to school here!"

Hearing this, Yuan Juan's heart trembled. She looked at Zhou Lei and asked, "What do you mean?"

Didn't you say she would only stay until the Chinese New Year and then have to go back?

Why do you need to bring the child along?

Do we still have to go to school here?

Zhou's mother glanced at her sideways, "Don't look at him. I'm the one who makes the decisions here!"

Yuan Juan: "..."

……

Is Battalion Commander Jiang home?

Hearing the sound, Yuan Xiu opened the courtyard gate, and there stood a villager carrying a load of firewood.

Yuan Xiu recognized this person; he was one of the fellow villagers Jiangzhou had invited to build a toilet at his home last time.

The villager had a simple smile on his face. "Battalion Commander Jiang's wife, I've come to deliver firewood to your family."

Yuan Xiu quickly let him in.

This wasn't the first time the villager had come; he carried the firewood directly into the kitchen and neatly stacked it next to the stove.

"How much?" Yuan Xiu asked.

The villager smiled and waved his hand, "Your Battalion Commander Jiang has already given it to me and told me to deliver it to your family every two weeks. If there's nothing else, I'll head back now."

Yuan Xiu escorted the person to the door.

After closing the door and returning to the kitchen, Yuan Xiu nodded in satisfaction as she looked at the firewood piled up in front of the stove.

She was worried that the coal stove and honeycomb briquette stove would be too small to cook and stir-fry when she hosted guests tomorrow. With the weather getting cold, she would have to use one of the two single-burner stoves for cooking and the other for stir-frying. She also had to stew soup, and she was afraid that one of the dishes would get cold as soon as it was cooked. But now, she doesn't have to worry about that tomorrow.

Jiangzhou arrived home promptly at 6:30.

"Has the firewood been delivered?" He entered the house, hung the hat he was carrying on the hook on the side of the wardrobe, and unbuttoned the top two buttons of his coat and shirt.

Yuan Xiu sat at her desk with a book in front of her. It was a book by Jiang Zhou, which she took out to pass the time since she had nothing to do at home.

"It's here."

Jiang Zhou nodded. "It's fine to use it occasionally. Burning firewood is too troublesome. A coal stove is more convenient for everyday use."

"You asked your fellow villager to deliver it every two weeks, but that's such a small amount, it's not enough to use all the time, is it?" Yuan Xiu said with a smile. "Now the vegetable garden in the yard won't have to worry about the vegetables not growing well, the wood ash can be used as fertilizer."

Jiang Zhou glanced at the book she was putting on the bookshelf. "Do you like reading?"

Yuan Xiu neither said she liked it nor disliked it, "I was just a little bored, so I took it out to look at it casually."

She looked up at Jiang Zhou, then waved the book in her hand. "Can I still read this book?"

"Sure." Jiang Zhou walked up to her, took the book from her hand, and said, "This book is about military affairs."

There were more than twenty books on the bookshelf, almost all of them related to industry. "If you want to read something else, you can borrow it from the library."

Yuan Xiu blinked. "There's a library in the family quarters?"

Jiang Zhou nodded, "Yes, it was established last year and is managed by the Parents' Committee. It's located near the activity center."

Yuan Xiu became genuinely interested. "I'll go take a look when I have time."

……

The dinner was scheduled for the evening. After a simple lunch, Yuan Xiu got busy.

The fish in the basin had been kept for two days and was already hovering between life and death. Yuan Xiu nimbly grabbed the fish and threw it on the ground, then picked up a knife and tapped it twice with the back of the blade. The grass carp, weighing more than five pounds, was dead.

Cut the fish head off separately and set it aside. Marinate it with ginger and scallions to remove the fishy smell.

She began slicing the fish, the white flesh being sliced ​​thinner than paper with her heavy knife, so thin that it glistened in the sunlight.

She chopped the pork bones into small pieces and simmered them slowly over a low flame on a honeycomb briquette stove. When they were almost done, she added the soaked dried shiitake mushrooms.

Pig intestines are quite troublesome. Yuan Xiu squatted by the well and washed them for a long time. After washing them, she first blanched them, then put in star anise, bay leaves and other spices, and slowly braised them in a pot.

Sister-in-law Guiying from next door came after smelling the aroma.

"Why are you cooking so early? I was going to come and help when it was almost time." Sister-in-law Guiying looked around the kitchen. The fish head and fish meat were marinating separately in a basin. There were two stoves, one with pork bone soup simmering and the other with braised pig intestines.

On the cutting board, several plates were neatly arranged, each containing chopped vegetables and seasonings such as ginger and garlic.

Despite having all these things on it, it wasn't dirty or messy at all. There wasn't even a watermark on the stove; it was wiped clean.

"You're so quick and efficient!" Sister-in-law Guiying couldn't help but praise. She had never seen such a capable young wife prepare so many things for herself.

Yuan Xiu smiled and said, "I'll do it slowly by myself, there's no rush."

"Even if it's slow, I've never seen anything like this." Sister Guiying sniffed. "It smells so good! No wonder you cook so well. Look at all this you've prepared. You even have to put the seasonings in bowls. When I cook, I just put in a couple of slices of ginger when I stew meat. If you ask me, even the chefs in our canteen don't cook as meticulously as you."

Yuan Xiu chuckled and said, "Sister-in-law, please don't praise me too much, or I'll feel like I'm flying to the sky."

"What's wrong with that? You deserve praise for doing well! It's just that I'm not very educated, otherwise I would have praised you to the skies!" Sister-in-law Guiying joked, "You're as beautiful as a flower!"

Yuan Xiu blushed with genuine embarrassment.

Sister-in-law Guiying is straightforward in both her scolding and praising.

Not long after, Sister Chunmei arrived, also to help.

"You're late, and I'm late too. Xiao Yuan did everything herself, even mixed the vegetables, just waiting for them to come home from get off work so she could cook them!"

Sister Chunmei looked and it was indeed true. "I could smell the aroma from outside. What is this? It smells so good!"

"Pig intestines." Yuan Xiu lifted the pot lid and flipped them over to prevent them from sticking to the pot.

Sister Chunmei leaned closer for a look and saw that the pig intestines were braised until they were a bright red color, and the aroma was so enticing that it filled her nostrils.

"I was going to come over and help you cook, but now I don't dare to do it."

"Right, that's what I said too," Sister Guiying laughed. "After cooking for decades, I don't even know what to do when I come to Xiao Yuan's place."

Sister Chunmei nodded, "That's true. It seems like all we can do is help wash the dishes."

While the pork bone broth and pig intestines simmered slowly in the pot, the three women each moved a stool and sat chatting at the kitchen doorway.

As they talked, Sister Chunmei brought up Yuan Juan's wedding from the previous day.

"Deputy Battalion Commander Zhou's mother is quite something. Yuan Juan barely got her seat on the table before she was woken up to cook. While she was cooking, she even moved a stool over and sat next to her, watching her closely. She'd always find something to say about everything, whether it was too hot or too much water. Everyone was listening intently to the commotion at her house while they cooked..."

Sister-in-law Guiying curled her lip. "She deserves it! She asked for all this suffering. What a fine young woman, why did she have to become a fake? If I were her, I would have bought a ticket and gone back to my hometown long ago. And she still has the nerve to fawn over Deputy Battalion Commander Zhou. Deputy Battalion Commander Zhou's mother is obviously shrewd; how could she not see through her little schemes?"

Yuan Xiu listened with a smile as her two sisters-in-law talked about Yuan Juan.

Knowing that she was not doing well, she felt very happy.