Chapter 142: Just Thinking About It Feels Cozy
“Ran Ran, cotton fruit, what are you going to do?”
Gray easily opened a cotton fruit, took out the snow-white cotton inside, and stuffed it into the large animal hide bag hanging on its body.
It mimicked Su Ran’s actions while asking.
“Use cotton to make clothes to wear in winter.”
“With cotton, Gray and Ran Ran won’t be cold in winter~”
Su Ran also had a large animal hide bag hanging on her body, and now the bottom of the animal hide bag was already slightly bulging from the stuffed cotton.
Su Ran’s hands moved quickly to open cotton fruits, and her actions of pulling out cotton and stuffing it into the animal hide bag were so fast they almost left afterimages.
“Ao wu……not cold? Gray doesn’t know how it’s not cold.”
After hearing Su Ran’s explanation, Gray shook its head, indicating it still didn’t understand how to use cotton for warmth.
Su Ran thought for a moment and pointed to the animal hide short-sleeved shirt on her body: “Use cotton to make clothes and animal hide blankets for sleeping into cotton ones, and it will be very warm.”
After speaking, she paused, then looked at Gray again: “Once it’s made, Gray will know!”
“Okay, ao wu~”
Gray nodded, its eyes still a bit confused, but upon hearing Su Ran say she would make clothes for it, its tail behind it had already stood up first.
Su Ran and Gray stayed busy on the opposite bank of the river until noon, during which Gray went back to fetch a few more animal hide bags.
By now, all these animal hide bags were fully packed.
So Gray first sent Su Ran back to this side, then returned twice to transport all the bags filled with cotton back.
The transported cotton was all first placed by Su Ran on the heated brick bed in the west bedroom.
She and Gray had collected cotton in nine large animal hide bags over the morning.
Su Ran thought that if she picked for another afternoon and brought back this much, it should be enough for her for the time being.
After returning home, Su Ran took out some dried blue worms and dried fruit, and ate some with Gray.
After eating, the two took a short nap at home before setting out again to pick cotton.
The two stayed busy until five in the afternoon before returning from the opposite bank of the river.
Gray also conveniently caught a red-skinned pig over there for today’s dinner.
The cotton picked today, packed in animal hide bags, had already filled up the heated brick bed in the west bedroom.
Su Ran thought that first, she needed to use this cotton to make a thick cotton felt that could cover the entire heated brick bed in the east bedroom.
When winter comes, no matter how cold it is outside, the room will have a fire lit, and the heated brick bed will be burning hot.
The felt mat beneath will be soft and warm; when idle, she and Gray could roast by the fire, brew some wild cabbage flower tea, eat some of her homemade small snacks—just thinking about it felt very cozy!
Because the current weather, though much cooler, was still a temperature where short-sleeved shirts weren’t cold, not suitable for food storage.
So Su Ran’s idea to store meat and fresh vegetables still had to be postponed.
Therefore, she planned to spend the next few days first making this cotton felt.
The inside of the cotton felt would use cotton, while for the outer skin wrapping the felt, Su Ran planned to sew four-eared ox hide for the bottom side and white-headed sheep hide for the top side.
Four-eared ox hide was a bit thicker than white-headed sheep hide.
Because the side of the felt facing down would directly touch the heated brick bed, compared to white-headed sheep hide and red-skinned pig hide, it would be a bit more heat-resistant.
White-headed sheep hide was softer, but also thicker than red-skinned pig hide. It wouldn’t wear out so easily, so Su Ran made it the side facing up.
This cotton felt looked large, but sewing it was actually quite simple.
Especially since Su Ran had previously sewn two animal hide blankets directly laid on the heated brick bed; with experience, her sewing speed was even faster.
She first sewed the felt outer skin panel for the bottom side.
She took out several already processed, complete four-eared ox hides, then stacked these hides layer by layer and spread them flat.
First, she cut these hides together with a knife into identical rectangles with smooth, straight edges, then pieced and sewed the hides together.
After sewing the outer skin panel for this side, Su Ran used the same method to sew the top layer as well.
Once both sides of the felt outer skin were sewn, it had used up eight complete four-eared ox cowhides and thirteen white-headed sheep hides in total.
After the outer skin panels were sewn, it was time to spread the cotton on top.
Su Ran estimated that to cover the entire heated brick bed with cotton and make it thick, this felt would need at least six large bags of cotton.
But this picked cotton couldn’t be used directly yet.
Because on this cotton, every clump contained two or three black seeds the size of rice grains.
Although sewing these seeds directly into the felt wouldn’t be noticeable, Su Ran was afraid they would sprout inside the felt!
So before spreading the cotton on the animal hide panel, Su Ran dragged Gray along for two days to pick out all the black small seeds from the six bags of cotton to be used.
Each cotton fruit seed had only two or three grains.
Though few, they were small; Su Ran managed fine, and after a few tries, found the trick—directly pinching them out with her nails.
But these small seeds weren’t so friendly to Gray.
Its hands were already large, with very long nails; the sharp weapons usually used against wild beasts and prey outside now seemed clumsy.
Pinching out that one small seed precisely was very difficult and slow.
Toward the end, it couldn’t help but hold a handful of cotton that wasn’t fully cleaned, looking at Su Ran pitifully:
“Ran Ran, can’t, don’t want to do it!”
Then, when Su Ran arranged for it to go to the seaside to pick up some seafood, it hurriedly grabbed the backpack and ran off!
After picking the seeds, Su Ran didn’t throw away these cotton seeds but carefully collected them, preparing to plant them next year.
By then, even if only two or three sprouted and grew into big trees, the fruit they bore afterward would be enough for her!
Removing the seeds from the cotton took two days.
Early this morning, after breakfast, Su Ran had Gray help move the four-eared ox hide outer skin panel sewn a couple days ago from the west bedroom to the east bedroom.
She first spread the entire panel out on the heated brick bed; after spreading, its size matched the heated brick bed perfectly.
Then she propped up the window in the east bedroom, propping it to the maximum to let sunlight shine into the room.
Next, she poured an entire bag of cotton onto the animal hide panel.
After pouring, Su Ran sat on the animal hide panel, spreading that pile of cotton bit by bit, laying it out, and pressing it as flat as possible.
Once she felt the thickness of the laid cotton was about right, she poured the second bag of cotton next to the already laid section, spreading it flat again as before, and continued likewise.
After covering the entire animal hide panel with cotton, Su Ran, with Gray’s help, brought over the white-headed sheep hide panel to be laid on top and covered it over the already spread cotton…
