Smile for the camera

Week one, proper

I arrive super early and hit the cupboard before I am bombarded with Santa and the other elves, but Santa is already there, fully made-up.

Someone has claimed my elf outfit and stuck their name on the hanger so I am left to find another, which I fumigate with Febreze.

I choose a hat, which is far to big and makes me look like sleepy out of the seven dwarfs, and slap on some rosy cheeks.

Today is a morgue compared to the other day’s hubbub, but there are several rushes throughout the day mainly consisting of crying babies, that despite my rattle shakes, and squeals of “smile for the camera”, “big smile”, do not look very photogenic in their pictures.

One elf has been struck down by the lurgy and a couple of hours in we are met with a red-cheeked replacement.

Today’s Santa is of a happy disposition but when there are no children waiting he disappears.

It turns out that he has disappeared not to feed the reindeers but to have a beard break.

The worst thing that happens today is dropping and subsequently breaking the much in-demand stapler (unbeknown to anyone else until now) and printing one photo four times – that really was the printer.

All in a day’s work.