Yu Dong was putting the lid on the alcohol jar after testing whether or not the wine that she prepared from the grapes that she grew in her backyard when Chen Mi came with Little bun in his arms. After two months of tender and careful care, little bun was no longer the same sickly looking child as he was at the time of his birth. Instead under Yu Dong's thorough care, little bun was now no longer the wrinkly ugly baby instead he was now chubby and round, he looked so adorable with his soft and delicate white skin, that many times Yu Dong would mistake him for a moving doll.
He looked so cute that Yu Dong found it impossible to look away from him. In fact, she wasn't alone, many villagers would gawk at Little Bun when Chen Mi took him out on a stroll.
Babies grew up quickly the same could be said for Little bun, now the once reserved child who only smiled and giggled once in a while started to crawl around in the house, Yu Dong was worried that he would get hurt so she had Shen Li and the others weave bamboo sheets and laid them on the floor, so at to make sure that Little bun doesn't scratch or hurt himself while crawling.
" Ah! Ah, mowwie!" now Little bun could speak one or two words though his pronunciation was a little off, everyone in the house could understand what he was trying to say. So, when Yu Dong heard Little bun cry ' mowwie' she knew that he was calling for her.
She smiled and stood up before washing her hands and wiping them, only then did she take Little bun in her arms " bun bun, did you miss mommy?"
"Ah!" replied Little bun slapping Yu Dong's face, though his antics still made Chen Mi and Ye Liu get on their toes, Yu Dong didn't mind his naughty antics.
Pinching little bun's chubby cheeks, Yu Dong cooed " so bun bun missed mommy? Mommy missed little bun too", as she spoke she rubbed Little bun's tummy with her nose, blowing raspberries making little bun giggle loudly.
" wife are you going to town ?" asked Chen Mi as he looked at the wine jars that were pulled out from the makeshift cellar in their backyard. He knew that his wife was working really hard these days, not only did she was consistent in going to the fields every day, she also took really good care of the berries and grapes growing in their backyard.
A month ago, she harvested buckets of grapes and asked the three of them to help her brew wine with it, though neither of them knew how to brew wine thankfully, Yu Dong knew and guided them well so they were able to brew a total of forty jars of wine.
" yes" answered Yu Dong as she stopped teasing Little bun and hugged him " the money at home is short now, And I want to renovate the house before winter. If not the roofs will leak when it snows in four months, we will in trouble if we don't repair the roofs by then, previously it was fine but now we have little bun with us, we can't take unwanted risks now. "
Though the money that Yu Dong had in her pocket was enough to repair the roofs, Yu Dong didn't want to just repair the roofs alone. She wanted to give her three husbands a decent life that's why she wanted to completely renovate the house and make separate rooms for each of them. She also wanted to make a floor instead of making do with bamboo sheets, for that she needed more money than just ten taels.
Chen Mi didn't question Yu Dong, from the past few months they were wearing clothes of fine fabric and eating nothing but polished rice and meat, the money at home must have depleted a lot, if not more.
" oh, Mi you are back?" Ye Liu who was in the kitchen cleaning the dishes, came out when he heard Chen Mi's voice. Shen Li had gone out to do the laundry so he wasn't at home with them right now, Yu Dong wanted to wait for him but she was afraid that if she delayed any longer, she might miss the opportunity to meet Song Yixu so she couldn't wait any longer.
She turned to Chen Mi and asked " did you call Aunt Wang? What did she say?"
Chen Mi who was chatting with Ye Liu nodded and answered with a smile " I already asked Aunt Wang to come and help us, she said that she will be here in a jiffy -"
As if to emphasise her in a ' jiffy', Aunt Wang's boisterous voice boomed from their front yard " Oi, Dong Dong, let's go! We need to hurry or else we will reach there at rush hour, it will troublesome by then"
"Yes" answered Yu Dong then she handed Little bun to Chen Mi before picking up two wine jars and walking out. Ye Liu and Chen Mi exchanged a glance then the two of them settled Little bun inside Chen Mi's room and started to help Yu Dong in piling the wine jars in Aunt Wang's ox cart.
" oh these are a lot" exclaimed Aunt Wang as she looked at her now completely full cart, " Dong Dong are you sure you will be able to sell this much at one go? I don't know but I think I will try my best. If it sells well then it's alright, if not it's alright too - I'm not greedy I just want a little money to subsidize my family nothing else"
"Well, are you going alone? " asked Aunt Wang nodding " I mean the jars are quite a lot you won't be able to keep them stable in my cart alone. What if they start tumbling down? You should bring someone with you just in case"
Yu Dong blinked and then turned to look at Chen Mi and Ye Liu, if Shen Li was here she could have taken him but now that he wasn't here, she could only take Ye Liu because Little Bun needed Chen Mi to take care of him.
"Alright, Liu come with me and Mi you better stay at home and don't open the door unless Li returns, if someone else other than Li comes you need to turn them away," said Yu Dong though she didn't want to leave Chen Mi behind, little bun was still too young to be brought to the town she was afraid that she might disturb him. So she decided to leave the two behind while taking Ye Liu with her.