newbobooks Chapter 652 Purchasing a dowry
Chapter 652 Purchasing a dowry
The old man suddenly realized and took the flower pot to water the strawberry bowl. He couldn't understand what these little girls were thinking.
Zhou Xing felt sad when she thought about leaving home, not knowing what the future would be like.
Li began to prepare her dowry, including gold and silver jewelry, her treasured money, furniture, fields, shops and houses. She was marrying into a wealthy landlord's family, not an ordinary peasant family, and if the dowry was too little, she would be laughed at.
When she meets other landlords and compares their daughters-in-law with those of other families, she will find that their dowries are small and their backgrounds are low. How can Zhou Xing hold her head up high?
The room was full of people, so I could only talk to Zhou Guo.
Zhou Guo was also having a headache about this matter. "Mom, I want to give my sister some land as a dowry, but you know that it is very difficult to buy land now. There are pieces of land here and there, and you can't even get one piece at a time. I asked Wu Jianghuzi to run around outside these days, but there is no news."
Li sighed, "Who said it wasn't? Well, let them run their own way. Anyway, we won't be able to go out until the beginning of next spring. We can take our time to look for things. Let's prepare the other things first. We still need to buy some gold and silver jewelry. The family has received a lot of fabrics from several shopkeepers over the years. Just a few more pieces will be enough. Then there are the furnitures. What should we do with them? Should we go to the mountains to find fabrics ourselves?"
Zhou Guo said, "How long will it take? Let's go to the city in a few days and buy a better set. But better furniture is expensive... Then we can wait until the autumn pine mushrooms are sold out, and then buy fabrics, jewelry, and other things. Do you think it's okay?"
Mrs. Li sighed, feeling sorry for her daughter, and said, "Don't blame me for preparing too much for your sister. A woman without a dowry can't hold her head up high in her husband's family. What's more, she is marrying into the Zhao family, a big landlord, and her social relations must be the same as those of an ordinary family. If she has nothing, she doesn't know what kind of hard life she will have in the future."
Zhou Guo smiled and said, "Mom, what are you talking about? Isn't this a good thing? We have money at home. We can make more money if we lose it. In fact, I think it would be the most disadvantageous for my sister to get married at this time. Our family is still in the initial stage. In two years, our family will definitely be different. But she can't wait, so we can only prepare more for her at this time. When she gets married, she will be a member of her husband's family."
Li said with relief: "I think so too. When you get married, I will definitely prepare more for you. You can share these things you made with your brothers or take half with you."
Zhou Guo said: "I won't get married."
Li said, "Nonsense, how can a person not get married? If you don't get married, your brothers and sisters will all get married and have their own families. Where will you go? Are you going to go out and beg for food?"
"Then I'll buy a house and move out. Can't I afford it? Mom, I'll pick you up and we'll live together. Is that ok?"
"Okay, if you really can't get married, I will live with you. Otherwise, you can find a live-in son-in-law and I will help you take care of the baby. Is that okay?" Li didn't take it seriously and was in a mood to joke. Little kids think one thing at a time, and their ideas will naturally change when they grow up.
The next day, Zhou Guo took old man Li to the provincial capital on the pretext of buying land.
With a clear goal in mind, they headed straight for the lumber shop.
After a round of shopping, I found that the expensive ones were too expensive and the cheap ones were not attractive.
In the end, it was Li who made the final decision. Cabinets and boxes were made of camphor wood, which would not be eaten by insects. Tables, chairs and benches were made of sour pear wood. There was only one set, which was to be placed in the hall to show off. The rest were all made of camphor wood.
The family's money was in her hands, so she naturally knew how to save it. She also had to buy land and a shop. As for furniture, two pieces would be enough to support the store, and she didn't need too much, after all, they couldn't make money with them.
After they had chosen the wood and style, the shopkeeper asked them about the dimensions and how big they wanted it to be.
Well, several people looked at each other, they seemed to have forgotten something.
Li said, "What should I do? I forgot to go to their house to measure it."
The old man said, "Then we can only come back later."
Zhou Guo waved his hand and said, "No need. The Zhao family is so big, but there are only a few masters. Can't they even put in one set of furniture? If there is really no room, we can just rebuild it."
After that, he said to the shopkeeper, "Forget about the other things, just make the cabinet bigger. Make it big for me, and the boxes bigger too."
The shopkeeper wiped his sweat and said, "Look, I have finished products in my shop. Would you like to take a look?"
It really was a large wardrobe that was more than ten feet long and five feet high.
When you open it, you'll see that it's divided into compartments and can hold a lot of clothes and quilts.
Zhou Guo smiled and said, "Just do it this way."
Li hesitated, "Isn't this too big? How can we transport such a large cabinet back?"
The shopkeeper said hurriedly, "Don't worry, ma'am. We will deliver the goods to your door. You don't need to worry about it."
The old man looked inside and out and nodded, "I think it's good. Girls like to make clothes and want to wear different clothes every day. They need such a big cabinet. If it's too small, there will be no place to store the clothes."
Zhou Guo smiled and said, "That's it, Master. You still understand us."
Mrs. Li thought about the clothes she had made for her two sisters in the past two years and smiled, "Yes, it's a lot. The clothes you have made in the past two years are more than those made by your brothers. So it's just a big wardrobe."
However, land and shops are different. If you give one as a dowry, you can produce grain and collect rent, which is very cost-effective.
Thinking of this, he felt that the facade was no longer necessary, so he said to Zhou Guo, "How about replacing the sour pear wood table and chairs with camphor wood? I thought about it carefully and felt that it was not cost-effective. It would be better to buy two more acres of land. What's the use of having a good appearance? Good things inside are the real good. What do you think?"
Zhou Guo said: "That's fine, the money is with you anyway, you can use it however you want."
The old man nodded, "Whatever you think is good."
Li made the decision, "That's it, the whole set must be made of camphor wood. It will also look nice when painted black. All black painted furniture will look so grand."
Zhou Guo didn't object, "As long as you like it."
Once you’ve chosen the style and size of the furniture, it’s time to negotiate the price.
Even if Zhou Guo didn't give in at all, the whole set was not cheap. It cost Li more than three hundred taels of silver. After all, camphor wood is not a cheap wood.
After looking at the furniture, they went to look at shops and bought two shops that were not in particularly remote locations and a large house with three entrances.
It was the first time for Li to enter such a large house. Everything she saw was new to her. "It turns out that the houses of wealthy families are built like this. I originally thought that our house was large, but I never thought that a truly wealthy family would be like this, with so many rooms, so large."
The old man said, "This is not considered big. The bigger ones have five or six courtyards. The bigger ones have no courtyards. The real wealthy families build courtyards on a large piece of land. After they build courtyards one by one and surround them with walls, they become their home."