Image from the web
At this point, my mother let my fourth sister take my cotton jacket and pants to the kitchen house and put them on the stove fire for a while. When the inside of the cotton jacket, and cotton pants legs are baked hot, the fourth sister held the pants and sleeves quickly into a ball, holding in the arms while running and calling me still in bed.
"Old five, quickly get up! Our mother asked me to help you bake the clothes, hot and warm, you do not get up a moment will be cold!" Only when I heard these words did I get up in a flash and quickly dress myself with the help of my fourth sister.
Cotton jacket, half-finished, not yet on the collar and buttons ~ picture from the network
Wake up and run to the kitchen, with the mother prepared hot water to symbolically wash the face, eat a piece of steamed buns and drink a bowl of steaming hot with sweet potato pieces of "mush" (polenta) with a plate of "beans". Grits". Such a simple and homely breakfast did not feel anything special at that time, but now looking back, I feel that it is the real delicacy on earth.
"Sweet potato grits" (corn porridge) Image from the web
"Bean grits" is the name of our hometown, and my mother's usual practice is to cut the heart of the cabbage into thin strips and put them with salted soybeans boiled in water, and then put some salt and a couple of drops of water on it. The last put a little salt and then two drops of sesame oil, practice is simple, but with the steaming hot corn porridge to eat up the flavor of the particularly fragrant and refreshing.
The old family "grits" is similar to this image from the network
If the weather is just after the snow, I will quietly bring a little bit of sugar after the meal, find a clean plastic belt in the schoolbag. These are the ingredients for making homemade ice cream with my buddies on the way to school.
The snow piled up a thick layer, and the field was already a pale one, and the branches of every tree on both sides of the countryside road were crystal clear.
After the fermentation of the soybean Figure life from the network
On the way to school, my friends and I would go to the shorter fork of the tree to take some clean-looking snow, put it in a plastic bag, put some sugar.
With the old old inside the printed multiplication table of iron stationery box smashed a few times, not long, the bag of snow will be accumulated in a piece of hard as ice, then a simple homemade "ice cream" on the production of success.
The stationery box image from the network
I and my little friend excitedly competed for the first each bite, it is really ice and sweet and cool through the heart!
Who has ever worn this "grass" when it snows?
In rural schools, there were no heaters in the classrooms. In order to keep warm, the most popular recreational activities among the children were throwing sandbags and playing shuttlecock.
Kick shuttlecock image from the network
The shuttlecock we play is very simple, with the waste of lightweight bags torn into a lot of long strips, and then a rope in the middle of a tie, finished, shake open, like a large embroidered ball. This shuttlecock that is lightweight, and will not hurt the feet, we are often on the spot, in a minute or two to do a good job.
When my feet were cold, my friends kicked the shuttlecock, and it was a competition to see who kicked the most.
I can only say that it is similar to this, but not quite the same image from the Internet
Of course, sometimes you can play that kind of shuttlecock can play a variety of patterns, the middle of a coin or a thin piece of iron with a rounded hollow, surrounded by colorful woolen threads, and finally cut into a length of about 10 centimeters, the shuttlecock practice is in fact also very simple, just to deliberately find the materials needed.
Image from the web
When I was a kid, I still preferred the bigger ones made from plastic bags. After a few minutes of casual play, your feet stop freezing and going numb and start getting warm.
Image from the network
When we were young, we played the game of throwing sandbags, which is different from the kind of kindergarten children play now, standing in front of a line, throw to a basket so simple to play.
At that time, there were a lot of students involved in throwing sandbags, and both boys and girls could play together. A group of children divided into two groups. The two lines were drawn parallel to each other on the ground, and of course, the two lines were as far apart as possible.
Throwing sandbags image from the network
A group first sent two students responsible for throwing sandbags back and forth outside the two lines, similar to the two people playing badminton. The difference is that the other group of children have to collectively stand in the middle of the two lines and let the two students at the end of the sandbag to throw.
Throwing sandbags image from the network
If the sandbags hit anyone and are not caught, that person is eliminated from the game. If one of the remaining teammates catches the thrown sandbag, then the team scores another point and can revive a teammate who had been eliminated.
Until the team is completely eliminated, it's time to swap missions with the other team, and it's their turn to throw the other team's buddies.
Throwing sandbags image via the internet
I especially love playing this game because it feels super exciting to run back and forth while dodging sandbags to get warm, and to occasionally make a big catch or two.
"Bump and Turn" image via the web
One of the first craft skills I got as a kid was sewing my own sandbags. Find a piece of sturdy old cloth, cut into six small squares, first sew four of them together to form a square tube, then patch the remaining two pieces at the ends, sewing, leaving a small hole, turn the whole sandbag over, fill it with some soybeans, can not be too solid, otherwise, accidentally thrown into the face will be very painful. Finally, sew the small hole, a sandbag is completed.
Sandbags image from the network
In fact, in the school can be active is a few minutes of recess, and so on all the classes to the end of the afternoon after school, the feet are still frozen wooden numb almost no feeling.
I ran home as soon as my shoes were off and immediately put my feet under the covers, and my mother would use a glass bottle filled with hot water as a hot water bag to warm my feet under the covers. The bottle was really good quality, hot water was loaded into it, and the thick glass didn't explode.
When I was a kid, the "hot water bag" - the bottle image from the network
It wasn't long before it was time for my favorite dinner. What I remember most is that my mother used to steam a big pot of steamed buns, and half a pot of sweet potatoes was boiled under the steam grate at the same time.
Whenever my mother shouted, "The buns are cooked, come over and drink the soup". The mother shouted, "Come over here and drink the soup!" "Drink the soup" is our hometown dialect, meaning: eat dinner. Mother shouted this voice, the sisters will answer the voice to run to the kitchen house.
"Mudu" (corn porridge) image from the Internet
My father, who had been helping my mother with the fire, would come to the hall and carry me, sitting under the quilt, directly to the woodpile in the kitchen, so that I could sit on the fire where he had been, and put my feet in thick cotton socks in the mouth of the fire to roast.
In winter, it was the warmest place in the house. It is also my warmest memory of winter.
Image from the Internet
The whole room in the kitchen was smoky but very warm because of the wood fire that had just been burned. A kerosene lamp was always placed on the bellows next to the stove. When my mother lifted the lid of the pot, fragrant steamed buns and the scent with a hint of sweetness from the sweet potatoes came to the surface. With this burst of heat, the kerosene lamp that weak light wavered violently, almost extinguished, the heat dispersed, the orange flame instantly restored straight become bright.
Kerosene lamp image from the network
Mother nimbly picked up a hot hot bun into the frame made of sorghum poles, the grate up, revealing a pot of sweet potatoes boiled to crack.
My mother took out a few pieces and put them on a plate, dividing them among my sisters, and my favorite was the one that was half-boiled and half-roasted on the side of the pot and dripping with sugar.
Image courtesy of the Internet
At this time, my father, my mother and my sisters stood, squatted or sat in the woodpile, and the whole family gathered around the stove, talking and laughing with the hot sweet potatoes in their hands. Sometimes my mother would press the sweet potatoes into puree and sprinkle some sugar on them, then add some water and some mixed grain "fried noodles" (fried mixed grain flour) with a burnt flavor, stirring with chopsticks and making sweet and fragrant "sweet potato fried noodles". That was my mother's favorite flavor.
"Fried Noodles" image from the web
At that time, the family was very poor, and seldom stir-fried food at night, and every time my mother would ask my father to roast a few pieces of "bean paste" in the process of burning the fire.
"Bean grits" This is a ball-shaped image from the Internet
In our hometown, the kind of fermented soybeans put on salt to make a cake or a nest, dried in the sun can be preserved for the whole winter. Every day when you eat it will be roasted with charcoal on both sides of the golden brown, there will be a special fragrance of beans.
"Bean grits cake" image from the network
With freshly baked buns we sisters ate very sweet. After eating if the mouth is dry, then casually in the pot out of a bowl of boiled sweet potato water, this dinner is complete.
On cold winter nights, when goose feather snow was falling outside the house, and the weak light of kerosene lamps was shining inside the house, the family could gather around the warm stove and eat steaming food, and that kind of dinner, although it was too simple to be simple, would give the heart a sense of fulfillment that was particularly happy.
Image from the Internet
Now the shadow of kerosene lamps is no longer seen at night in my hometown, but the orange light has always been swaying in my memory, which is still unforgettable to me.
Now in the south, every winter is always rainy. At this time always start to miss the winter in the north when I was a child, so a cold winter night, the family gathered around the happiness and warmth.