The First Day

Writing as Twinkle the Elf, leaving the workshop and encountering the outside world for the first time there's a few things I noticed on day one in the grotto. 

1. Children are fine, parents are scary. It should definitely be them who are threatened with the naughty list. Admittedly most of them had been queuing for 2-3 hours but if you bring your child to see Santa on the day of his big arrival what do you expect and STOP TRYING TO BUMP UP THE QUEUE. 

2. We elves are capable of many things but we cannot use our magic to conjure up a great family photo if your child is screaming/crying/hiding/weird looking, even if it is 'baby's first Christmas'. Wait till baby has the ability to control its head movements before demanding a refund. 

3. Stopping elves working to tell them how long you have been waiting will not make elves work any faster. Eventually getting to the top of the queue and spending 20 minutes deciding which photo of crying baby is best will also not speed things along. 

4. Teenagers will never ever tire of heckling.

One day down, six weeks to go!