Chapter 236 - 127: The Invisible Barrier

Chapter 236: Chapter 127: The Invisible Barrier

Jiang Wanyi was so exasperated it gave her a headache, and she gave the baby’s little bottom a light smack.

She’d thought it was motherly love at work, but it turned out the baby was just hungry.

"You just wait."

Still refusing to accept it, Jiang Wanyi carried the child back to the bedroom. After feeding her for a little while, she brought Mili back out.

"Sweetheart, stand nicely right here."

She had Little Mili stand up, holding onto the playpen fence. Jiang Wanyi then backed away, sat down on the other side, and clapped her hands to get her attention.

But Little Mili only glanced at her before her eyes crinkled into a happy squint, and she giggled as she headed for Chen Yuan.

"Dada..."

"Dada..."

She managed to take four determined steps before throwing herself into Chen Yuan’s arms.

A death glare shot over from the side. Sensing danger, Chen Yuan immediately scooped up the child and made a run for it.

"We’d better get out of here. Mommy’s about to blow a fuse."

Seeing Chen Yuan carry the child over to the sofa, Jiang Wanyi put her hands on her hips and laughed in exasperation. She knew she had only been asking to be humiliated.

"What do you want for dinner? I’ll go cook."

Jiang Wanyi knew there was no point in sticking around, so she decided not to linger.

"Let’s just eat whatever we have at home. Don’t take Mili out to buy anything in this weather."

"In that case..." Jiang Wanyi thought for a moment. "I learned a new recipe online for stir-fried pork belly with pickled cabbage. They say it tastes just like the pickled cabbage you get at a barbecue place."

"Let’s have that, then."

"You go play with the baby. I’ll go cook."

"Okay."

Chen Yuan got into the playpen and played with the baby.

With a new toy to play with, Little Mili was completely engrossed. All Chen Yuan had to do was watch her.

On his phone, Chen Yuan received a message from Song Jianye.

Song Jianye: "I’m home!"

Song Jianye: "[Image]"

Song Jianye: "Wait, no, this isn’t my house. It’s my uncle’s."

The photo was taken from inside a home, showing the view outside.

Floor-to-ceiling windows, a large, single-floor apartment.

Chen Yuan couldn’t estimate the exact size, but it had to be at least 400 square meters.

Song Jianye: "It’s the holidays now, so the cafeteria food sucks. You can go eat at the hotel."

Chen Yuan: "If you’re not going, I’m not going either."

Song Jianye: "No way! I even had the kitchen prepare something good for you. They’re saving the best cut of beef for you."

’This friendship was definitely worth it, even if he was a bit of a pain sometimes.’

After chatting with Song Jianye for a bit, he received a message from Fang Youning.

She had already gotten off the high-speed train, and her parents were waiting outside to pick her up.

In the kitchen, Jiang Wanyi was making dinner.

Usually at this time, she would cook while watching the two of them play, but today she wasn’t in the mood.

From time to time, she would take out her phone, switch to the front-facing camera, and look at herself to minutely adjust the position of her hair clip.

She didn’t think the little clip looked cheap; she simply thought it was pretty, as if it had given her a whole new style.

About an hour later, the meal was ready. Besides the pan-fried pork belly with pickled cabbage, she had also made fish-fragrant pork slivers, a dish Chen Yuan loved. Everything looked delicious.

In addition, she had also cooked some thin noodles for Little Mili. It was safe to say their dinner was quite a feast.

"She’s about to turn one. When do you think would be a good time to wean her?"

"Around two," Chen Yuan said.

"This isn’t just my opinion; it’s what the WHO says. They recommend weaning between eighteen months and two years. But it really depends on your personal situation. You can’t stay home forever; you’ll have to go back to work someday, and it might not be convenient to breastfeed then. Try to make it to two years if you can, but if you can’t, it’s not a big deal."

Jiang Wanyi thought about it and realized he had a point.

’She’s been nursing for almost a year now, so it should be fine.’

"Is it true that after they turn two, there’s not much nutrition left? That it’s basically just water?"

"You can’t generalize like that," Chen Yuan said after thinking for a moment.

"You could say the nutritional value decreases, or rather, that it can no longer meet all the nutrients a growing child needs. When I went back to my hometown, my grandma told me she still had milk when my dad was six years old. She ended up feeding it all to the dog. Said it made the dog’s coat really shiny."

"AHAHAHA..."

Jiang Wanyi laughed so hard she sounded like a honking goose. "I doubt I could last until she’s six, even if I had an endless supply. I’d never be able to go back to work."

"Of course," Chen Yuan said as he ate. "But she’s already nursed for a year, so it would be fine even if you weaned her now. Some things are decided by genetics. Post-natal factors probably only account for twenty percent."

"It’s like how some people don’t touch a drop of alcohol and live a disciplined life, but still die young. Then you have others who smoke, drink, and get their hair permed, and they live to be a hundred. Besides, formula-fed babies are also weaned around the one-year mark. So don’t get hung up on it. Mili has already hit the milestone."

"I’m a little worried, though. She seems really attached to nursing. Even when she’s full from solid food, she still wants to nurse for a bit. I can’t even imagine how much she’ll cry if I wean her."

"That’s easy. When you want to wean her, just dab a little salt water on your nipple. After a few days of it tasting wrong, she won’t want it anymore."

Jiang Wanyi remembered that time she’d gone to the gym. Mili refused to nurse when she was sweaty.

"I’ll do what you said."

As she held the small bowl and fed Mili, Jiang Wanyi’s mood improved considerably.

She had been mulling over these issues for the past few days but hadn’t been able to figure anything out.

But now that Chen Yuan was here, everything was better. He laid everything out so clearly, it was as if her problems were no problem at all.

Once she was full, Little Mili grew restless in her high chair, babbling and cooing.

Her "language system" had evolved quite a bit recently, and she could now produce a wider variety of weird and wonderful sounds.

Sometimes, she could even make a sound like the word "no."