Yu Le picked up two small cotton jackets and small cotton pants sewn for his children, looked them up and down, and was full of praise: "Yes, very good! Although this dress is a little simpler and has no colors, it is good that both men and women can wear it." The little guy in my family, whether he is a girl or a boy, is born in the future, and he is dressed very appropriately. ”

Shen Juan smiled: "The conditions are limited, so I can only sew like this." Pour also save points for gender. There are a few sets of big ones, but now I will wear them for Xiao Liu Xi, and when she can't wear them, I will wash them and leave them for your children. Small babies grow quickly, and within a few months, they have to change sizes. Therefore, it can only be worn on it, so as not to waste the fabric. ”

Wu Yun on the side was changing new clothes for her child, and she smiled when she heard it: "This can only wronged you and wear my Xiaoxi's old clothes." ”

Yu Le smiled: "It's okay, it's okay." I now have a very strong premonition that my family must be a kid......"

Shen Juan and Wu Yun interrupted him together: "Why?

"No!" Yu Le said: "It's because he's noisy enough, you don't know, every night, this little guy has to kick my cousin's stomach, it's so big, it's about to burst out of his belly, it scares me, if it's not a kid, can it be so noisy!"

Lu Lin, who was on the side, reached out to pinch his ears when he heard this.

Yu Le didn't care, and continued: "So, little Liu Xi, she is destined to be my daughter-in-law in the future." Wearing her old clothes now, there's nothing to be aggrieved about. ”

Lu Lin listened to the willow eyebrows upside down, and pulled his ears longer and longer: "Are you ashamed?"

Wu Yun said with a smile: "If it's really a young man, then it's a good thing to make them a pair." When I was a child, I wore the same clothes, isn't that a great fate? ”

Yu Le said: "That's it, that's it!"

As he spoke, he changed the topic and said what was in his heart: "By the way, Sister Shen, how much fabric do we have?"

Shen Juan shook her head and said, "No!"

Yu Le said: "Nothing at all?"

Shen Juan said: "Yes." Originally, it was calculated, and there was still something left. But when making quilts, everyone discussed it and felt that it was too cold in winter, so they made more cotton bombs and thicker. Now there are just some wool left, ready to be used as sweaters. By the way, why are you asking this, you still want to make clothes?"

Yu Le shook his head and said, "No." Our big ship, still short of canvas fabric, want to see if you have any way here. ”

Shen Juan said: "That's no way. The cotton has run out, unless you go out again to find the raw materials and come back. ”

Yu Le said: "Then what raw materials can I find? For canvas, I need a material that absorbs less water and is easy to dry." Cotton doesn't seem to fit well, and there's no cotton to be found around here. ”

Shen Juan thought for a while and said, "Then use ramie!"

Yu Le didn't hear clearly, so he asked more: "What hemp?"

Shen Juan said: "Ramie! When I was a child, in addition to growing cotton for textiles, my family would also grow some hemp to make clothes. This kind of linen cloth is very popular with farmers who do farm work, because it disperses quickly and dries easily. ”

Yu Le said: "Oh, that's great. To be honest, I don't even know it, and I can't even recognize who is called ramie. ”

Shen Juan said: "It is easy to find wild ramie on sandy soil. I remember that when we went out to sea to dig for sea intestines, wild ramie grew on that coast, and it was estimated that it could be harvested at this time. We can go and chop two boats and come back. But it's early, it's already winter, and as soon as the frost falls, it's all wilted. ”

Yu Le said: "Then let's go now?"

Shen Juan said: "It's best to go now, you put a little work on smoked bamboo, take us out, just harvest the hemp stalks, and leave the next work to us women." ”

So the next day, Yu Le organized people and went out.

Tian Qiuqiu, Lu Lin, and Wu Yun were left at home, and the others were all launched.

Harvest wild ramie!

Find a ramie field, cut it from the roots with a knife, and then peel the branches and leaves, as long as there is a long stem in the center, and tie it into bundles with rice stalks.

After two days of work, he cut down two large boats full of them and brought them back to his lodgings.

These two big boats of hemp stalks, according to the estimation of Shen Juan, can spin five or six hundred catties of linen.

This is not only enough to make three large canvases, but also to weave a hemp rope that is as thick as a thumb and more than 150 meters long according to Yu Le's requirements. This will be useful in the future sailing.

For the rest, you can also make a few more sets of clothes, this kind of fabric, which is especially comfortable to wear when it is hot.

That is, when they saw this half-human-tall plant, those women, including Yu Le and Li Zhi, all had blank expressions on their faces.

"What kind of process does it have to go through to make this little stem the size of a little finger become a piece of cloth?"

"Linen and hemp stalks, these are two completely different things, no matter what, there is no way to connect the two!"

Cotton is easy to understand, people are originally a ball of fiber, and if you stretch it, it will become a thread for weaving.

But what do you have to do to turn people into fibers for this dwarf plant?

But if you want to say no, the ancients, thousands of years ago, used this plant to make clothes and wear.

It seems that the wisdom of the ancients is really enough!

Anyway, for laymen like Yu Le and Li Zhi, if they ponder for ten years, they may not be able to figure out a way to turn this kind of grass into linen.

asked Shen Juan, and Shen Juan sold Guanzi: "Yes." I'm sure it can turn into sackcloth, you'll know then!"

So when he returned home, Shen Juan began to command.

The women helped spin the cotton, and at this time they were basically idle and had nothing to do, so it happened that there was a new task.

The work of shaving the skin of smoked bamboo, that is the business of two men. At most, I occasionally called over to help lift the bamboo.

Shen Juan led the women to peel off the skin of the hemp stalks one by one.

What you want is this outer skin.

This is called ramie.

Then he asked Yu Le and Li Zhi to dig a big pond behind the house.

In the pool, water is stored.

He threw the peeled ramie into the basin and pressed it with a board and stones.

This is a soaking process.

This process is critical and is called degumming.

It turns out that the ramie skin is soaked and detextured, and the rest is the fiber that can be used as fabric!

It's that simple!

But if you are not an expert, if you want to break your head, you will not think that this fiber is hidden in ramie. And how to extract it!

Thanks to an insider like Shen Juan!

(End of chapter)