Featured Image Credit: Tim Graham Photo Library/Stringer/Anadolu via Getty Images
Topics: Kate Middleton, Prince George, Prince William, Royal Family, Princess Diana
Britt Jones
Topics: Kate Middleton, Prince George, Prince William, Royal Family, Princess Diana
On Prince George's 11th birthday, he celebrated a wonderful tradition which the late Princess Diana began that probably wasn't in line with Royal etiquette.
As we pass the anniversary of her tragic passing, the ways which Diana influenced her family to try new things is still continuing to this day.
While royal biographer Robert Lacey noted that parents Prince William and Kate Middleton have tried to make sure their children have 'normal' upbringings, it's perhaps something they took from the princess' own beliefs.
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Her death was a tragic event that rocked the world on 31 August 1997, after she died from severe injuries caused by a car collision in Paris.
The 'People's Princess' was in the car with her rumoured boyfriend Dodi Fayed, Diana's driver Henri Paul and Dodi’s bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones as they travelled through the Pont de l'Alma underpass.
However, when paparazzi hounded the car and pushed them to speed off to get away, the driver is reported to have lost control of the vehicle, crashing into a column in the tunnel which killed himself and Dodi instantly.
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Diana and her bodyguard were alive, but barely when firefighters and emergency response arrived, and a firefighter unknowingly heard her utter her final words ever spoken: “Oh my God, what’s happened?”
Her death shocked the nation and the world, who mourned for weeks and continue to remember her each year that passes.
But her sons have famously tried to live a life in ode to their mother, with Lacey writing in his 2021 book Battle of Brothers: "William's aim as a father, the prince stressed, was to give his son 'a normal family upbringing', enabling the monarchy 'to stay relevant and keep up with modern times'.”
It seems this has also extended to birthday celebrations.
Julia Samuel, one of Princess Diana's best friends, and godmother to Prince George has opened up about ways the family keep her traditions alive.
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Speaking on an episode of podcast How to Fail with Elizabeth Day in 2020, Samuel shared memories of her friend which marked what would have been Diana's 59th birthday.
She said: "I do to George what [Princess Diana] did to us, which is give impossible toys that are really noisy and take a lot of making."
She continued: "William then has to spend days putting them together. And then put all the machinery together, and it makes awful tooting noises and lights flashing and all of that."
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She added: "It makes George laugh."
She noted that Prince George is 'amazing', and while Diana heartbreakingly never got to meet her grandchildren, she expressed belief that she would have adored them.
She said: "He's funny and feisty and cheeky and God she [Diana] would have loved him so much. That is heartbreaking for all of them."
Prince William appeared in the 2017 documentary Diana, Our Mother: Her Life and Legacy, and gave further insight into his way of parenting while keeping the spirit of his mother alive.
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He shared: "We've got more photos up round the house now of her and we talk about her a bit and stuff. And it's hard because obviously Catherine didn't know her, so she cannot really provide that level of detail.
"So I do, regularly, putting George or Charlotte to bed, talk about her and just try and remind them that there are two grandmothers, there were two grandmothers in their lives. And so it's important that they know who she was and that she existed."
He joked: "She'd be a nightmare grandmother, absolute nightmare! She'd love the children to bits, but... She'd come in probably at bath time, cause an amazing amount of scene, bubbles everywhere, bathwater all over the place ‒ and then leave."