Getting busy...

Mistletoe silly season really has begun now.  Spent today fielding many mistletoe enquiries - mostly media-related.  Early start (1.5 hour drive) at Tenbury High School for 0845 to talk mistletoe at the Lower School assembly (back tomorrow for the Upper School, which will include this year's Mistletoe Queen etc).  Followed by pow-wow on Mistletoe Festival related matters at the school. 

And then into Tenbury town to talk TEME mistletoe business - ranging from where the stock is coming from, to where we're sourcing the mailing boxes this season, and should we change the sizes? 

All alongside hurried email discussions about mistletoe promotions next week (more on those another time). 

Plus going out and checking venues for some BBC filming of mistletoe harvesting. 

Phone messages - at home and on mobile - from newspapers and agencies looking for info on sales this year, and can they have pictures from last year.  Emails re the same thing.  Dispatching mail-order mistletoe too - and finding we need to order more parcel tape.  And an early (season) radio interview for BBC Radio Cumbria.  So, not back home again until late afternoon, where (some of) TEME's mailing boxes for this season have arrived - so that's one less worry.

Busy, and interesting, day so shouldn't grumble.  But it was a beautiful sunny day, with those lovely long autumn shadows, and the orchard we surveyed for the BBC venue was crying out for several hours of (relatively relaxing) mistletoe photography. 

Will have more time tomorrow, but the forecast is rain...

Mistletoe Promotion of the Day.... French Mistletoe Seller Pic #1

'Marchandes de Gui', aka Mistletoe Sellers, were once a common New Year phenomenon in France.  And there are several famous portraits of them - including efforts by Picasso and Kirchner.  Plus a lot of sepia postcard photos of the real thing. 

I'll post examples of several in the run-up to Christmas, starting with this 1907 portrait by Adrien Barrere - available in poster format at AllPosters.