52 Splurging Housewife
“This is ridiculous! No one cares about that move? It is such a waste of land and money!”
“Ms. Fang should be a fierce Mother-in-law. She is being so stupid now!”
“Well, that daughter-in-law is the child of a County Officer! She must be dominating the whole family! Even if Ms. Fang is fierce, so what? It is such a misfortune that they have a daughter-in-law . They are going to have a very difficult time in life!”
Many people got jealous of Shao Yunduan who married the daughter of the County Magistrate. They were all waiting to see the ridiculous scenes arising from the Shao Family. They were all ears for such gossip.
Almost everyone around nodded and agreed. They started to mock the Shao Family, as if there was definitely going to be a lot of unpleasantness since Shao Yunduan married Qiao Xuan.
Eventually, they all came to one conclusion. “Just wait and see. It is never going to stop!”
“But what is the daughter-in-law doing inside the wall?” Someone asked.
They were all startled.
“Yes, what is she doing?”
“It is so stupid to have built a wall around a wasteland!”
They dropped the topic, when they failed to come to a conslution.
But whenever they had a get-together, they would always gossip about the splurging housewife of the Shao Family, and even made up a lot of jokes, just to wait and see how the family was going to deal with the trouble.
Ms. Niu and Ms. Ma were also very curious. They went to the door and asked what was going on.
Qiao Xuan never tried to conceal the truth. So she said straightforwardly, “Planting fruit trees and mushrooms.”
But she skipped telling them about the medical herbs.
Ms. Niu and Ms. Ma, who did not believe what Qiao Xuan was saying, started to mumble among themselves when they saw the serious look on Qiao Xuan’s face.
“But that wasteland is full of stones, hard and thin, not a good place for fruit trees at all. You are just wasting your money!”
“True, you might as well give me the bricks to build a pigsty!”
Qiao Xuan let them talk without saying anything in return.
When they learned the answer, they started to spread the story and it became the topic of gossip among the villagers.
The following day, Qiao Xuan started to buy fruit trees in the village. She picked the really thick ones, cut them and transplanted them directly. She explained to those confused people that she would do something about it later.
She needed bowl-thick or arm-thick ones, which could be transplanted directly.
In the village, some fruit trees were planted in front of and behind the houses, in the corner of the vegetable garden, and on the edge of the field. Although most of the fruit trees that were planted in this manner were actually unable to bear fruit at all.
In spring, the flowers were full of trees and lively, and the small fruits were densely packed, but basically they could not be kept.
When rain came constantly, they tended to fall little by little. In autumn, it was very difficult for them to have any good fruits to eat.
Only bayberry, persimmon, loquat, and jujube would have been harvested.
But the harvest only happened in some years, not every year.
Usually, the main function of these fruit trees was the natural melon shelf. Everyone liked to dig a hole under the tree to plant some melons, and then let the melon vines climb up, such as pumpkin, winter melon, gourd melon, loofah and so on.
Therefore, the so-called ‘fruit trees’ were worth no money in other people’s eyes.
When Qiao Xuan decided to buy the fruit trees, everyone was laughing at her.
“What are you buying these for! For firewood?”
“She knows nothing. She has never lived in the countryside before. She thinks that only by buying the fruit trees would get fruits! Haha!”