63: Chapter 1 Half a Year 63: Chapter 1 Half a Year Spring passed and autumn arrived, and in the blink of an eye, more than half a year had passed.
“Sister-in-law, where is Little Niangao?
Why can’t I find him in the room?” Shen Xiu asked with a frown and a worried expression.
“Try looking under the table,” Lin Xiaoguai responded without looking up from the handkerchief she was embroidering.
Sure enough, Shen Xiu found Little Niangao under the table.
The little boy was sound asleep with his arms and legs spread out, his small chest rising and falling rhythmically.
She couldn’t help but laugh softly and carefully picked up the little boy from under the table.
No wonder her sister-in-law had insisted on covering the house with rugs.
With a lively nephew like theirs, it really was necessary.
Weighing the child in her arms, Shen Xiu exclaimed in surprise, “Sister-in-law, what have you been feeding Little Niangao?
I haven’t held him for just a month, and he’s become so heavy?”
– To prepare for the middle school exams, she hadn’t been home for a month, and usually only saw her little nephew when her sister-in-law brought her meals.
In half a year, Shen Xiu had also changed significantly, thanks to Lin Xiaoguai who always prepared nutritious and tasty food and the continuous use of homemade soap, she finally looked like a blossoming young girl should.
With snowy skin, black hair, and wearing a blouse and long skirt made by Lin Xiaoguai, her originally plain appearance had become especially striking.
Although she had changed a lot herself, Shen Xiu felt that the biggest change was in her sister-in-law.
After more than a year of using spiritual spring water for “Wash Marrow and Cut Tendons,” Lin Xiaoguai’s skin had become even more delicate and glowing, so smooth that not even pores were visible, enhancing her already exquisite features.
Her previously somewhat dry hair, improved by the homemade soap, now flowed like a black waterfall, incomparable even to the world’s most luxurious black satin.
If the change in appearance was subtle and hardly noticeable without close attention, the change in her aura was revolutionary.
Her long hair loosely braided and hanging to the side, always dressed in simple blouses and long skirts, and a slight smile that made it hard to look away.
It was as if something had settled, or like a jade being polished, exuding a restrained and gracious beauty.
Shen Xiu thought, if her brother came back and saw his wife , he would definitely be stunned.
It had been more than half a year without any news from her brother.
Even during the years he was on the battlefield, he tried to come back for the New Year, but last year he didn’t, and he didn’t even send a letter explaining why.
In the neighborhood and in Yuanjiazhuang, rumors had started that her brother had been sacrificed.
Initially, she would confront those spreading the rumors, but gradually she found it meaningless.
But her sister-in-law…
seemed always composed.
Her heart didn’t know what to feel, it was as if she was relieved yet also somewhat dissatisfied.
Last time, grandpa sneaked some fatty meat into his mouth, and he got addicted.
Grandpa wouldn’t listen to me, always feeding him meat behind my back,” Lin Xiaoguai also felt helpless.
Their son was not even nine months old, and if not for the variety of health-boosting things she fed him, eating meat like that, he would have probably been sick vomiting and having diarrhea.
“It’s all right, having something to eat is good,” Shen Xiu remarked nonchalantly, remembering when they had little to eat during their own childhood.
Perhaps due to Shen Chi’s continued absence, besides Lin Xiaoguai, the other three in the family doted on Little Niangao excessively.
Shen Xiu sat beside Lin Xiaoguai and placed her little nephew on her lap, turning to look at the handkerchief in her hands, “Is this for Little Niangao?” The lifelike little white cat on it certainly wasn’t suitable for anyone else.
Her sister-in-law’s embroidery work was exceptionally fine—though many locals could stitch, none had ever seen the extraordinary embroidery skills like her sister-in-law’s.
Perhaps that’s the difference between a genius and an ordinary person.
Sometimes she really didn’t understand her sister-in-law, who would rather run tutoring classes to earn money for the house than sell her embroidery.
Once, a lady from the provincial city offered two hundred yuan to buy her handkerchief, but she refused.
Last month, someone came to buy their little embroidered screen of ‘Red Plum in the Snow’ for two thousand yuan, and her sister-in-law likewise refused without hesitation.
Initially, she and her grandparents felt it was a pity, but after similar incidents, they simply turned a blind eye.
“Yes, he likes this little cat the most,” Lin Xiaoguai smiled lightly, her son had already started to develop his own taste in aesthetics.
Shen Xiu rummaged through the basket of needlework and found a half-finished bright pink blouse, her eyes lit up, “Is this for me?” She knew her sister-in-law didn’t like wearing brightly colored clothes, and neither did her grandparents suit such vivid colors.