Christmas Day walk in Sandringham

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This is such a strange thing....so the royal family walk along a stretch of path every year and people gather to watch them. These people try to talk to the Wales children and give them presents. They are photographing the children, taking selfies, etc. I think the kids are far too young to do this. It is so odd.

How on earth do William & Catherine think this is okay?!

So the Christmas walk isn’t vastly different from other walkabouts - apart from the children being there.

The royals get all sorts of odd gifts given to them alongside flowers on official engagements when they do walkabouts.

They try to record all the gifts on official trips. If you look at this list from 2020 anywhere the giver is not named it’s from an individual on a walkabout.

They get things like mugs and cushions. and loads of things for the kids - soft toys and crafting items etc.

https://www.royal.uk/sites/default/files/documents/2025-05/The%20Duke%20and%20Duchess%20of%20Cambridge%20-%20Republic%20of%20Ireland%20March%202020.pdf

I think it’s the children interacting with the crowd that people have an issue with. They are not adults. They don’t have any choice and they are basically being used as fodder.

I don’t know. The kids and parents were constantly being handed, flowers, selection boxes, tubes of sweets, teddies, books, cards, pictures. Their staffs hands were full and they were taking it away and putting it somewhere. I have no idea. Hundreds?

I have more of an issue with the kids being lured towards the crowd by weird people using the gifts to attract them, the crowd asking for hugs and selfies and saying inappropriate things and the parents and security not stopping it happening.

In days gone by..

I found it really uncomfortable to watch.

Yes, let them decide at 16 if they want to interact with the gawpers. That’s fair enough. Until then, keep them at a distance so they can’t be pawed.

I very much agree that this issue needs to be addressed.

So William and Harry weren’t protected either by the adults around them. Is that supposed to be a good thing? Bad parenting and a lack of protection towards their children seems to have been a thing for years in the royal family then.

I wonder if they were also put in a position where they were giving hugs to creepy people back then. I suppose selfies weren’t really a thing.

I genuinely find it disturbing. It can’t be justified and shouldn’t be happening. William and Kate need to act and I really hope they do after this year. The hugs and the nanny Diana weirdo were too much.

I mean this is absolutely what I am talking about when I say that William is too indoctrinated to see the issues with this.

But it has also turned up a notch. Obviously Charlotte is a lovely outgoing and trusting little girl. But she is too young to be encouraged to fill whatever emotional void that adults looking for hugs are looking to fill.

I agree.

It’s an emotional void at best. What happens when a perverted man wants to hug this girl?

It needs to stop.

I have already said it was 2024. Why would I make something up?

William and Kate seem to put a lot of thought into their parenting. They’ve clearly judged that this is an acceptable way for the kids to get used to dealing with the public. They’re going to have this their whole lives and their parents know better than me if this is the right way to do it or not.

This is an important point - George will be King and as such, it’s reasonable to assume he will accept the role and so yes, this will be his “job” as an adult. But Charlotte and Louis are the “spares”, given how the last two spares have turned out, it might not be a good idea to encourage or assume this will be their job as adults.

Their judgment is questionable if they seriously think this is acceptable. Just because they may have to handle the public in their adult life doesn’t mean they have to do it to early to get them used to it. Thats a really messed up way of thinking.

If someone posted to say they asked children they don’t know for hugs, let’s say their neighbours children, they would be told they are highly inappropriate. People would expect their parents to protect them from it. Royal or not, they are still children and certain boundaries should be in place for every child.

Agree. ( although Id ssy 3 spares if we are including Margaret) The RF are assuming they will be doing this as adults which suggests they are expecting or clinging onto, business as usual. We have seen the problems the ' spares' have had yet it seems little is being done to prepare this generation for anything but a life of dependency on their father and then their brother, while getting less and less relevant, but still expected to be fodder to protect the Monarchy first and foremost. Will people come out flag waving for a middle aged brother of The King in 50 years time? They should be told that they are free to pursue their own careers and interests, not groomed from childhood to expect to make inane conversations with some oddballs for the rest of their lives.

I very much agree with you. How awful as a child growing up knowing your a spare and being treated differently. Must be very hard to understand for a child.

My nephew is always wanting to copy his older brother and have what he has, he even asks what his brother is eating and how much and wants fhe same 🤣

I thought they were modernising...this is anything but. I saw the walk and that guy who made that comment about Diana being proud to George, I literally rejoined I disgust. Its so repulsive and to expose the children to that...poor George he looks a bit bewildered at that comment.

Why can't they join the walk but not actually meet people just walk down the middle.

It does feel like they don't seem to learn any lessons.

Although security did have to step in on one of the walkabouts following the death of the Queen when a crazy American tourist grabbed Kate's hair to force her into a selfie.

However - the rf have to learn to manage risks - even the kids as George will soon be a teenager, at secondary school with more independence. But it is never risk free - just ask Queen Elizabeth and Charles who were both shot at and Princess Anne subject to an attempted kidnapping....

How awful as a child growing up knowing your a spare and being treated differently. Must be very hard to understand for a child.

It's not necessarily as dramatic as that. Many families run family businesses. It's quite possible to be loved equally as a family member and yet have a different role in the family business.
Thousands of less important people than the royals manage this (farmers being just one example that springs to mind).

Yes - my SIL knew very early on that her brother would inherit and not her - small rural farming community.

I assume she didn't write a book about getting fewer sausages 😊

The history of spares and their mental state isn't great.

Harry left. Andrew, well plenty on other threads about him. Margaret unfulfilled and constrained by her position. George 6 was a spare originally and had to step up, but he hated being King.

All this talk of getting Charlotte and Louis ready for their positions when for generations their predecessors in terms of spares seem to have major issues with finding some kind of relevance and purpose in life.

I don't see how things are going to be any different with this generation, and agree that Charlotte and Louis have no need to be wheeled out publicly because when they're adults they will, like Harry before them, become irrelevant. And then what? What good is it doing them?

It is really hard to say what was cause and effect.

The royals were much more formal in previous decades so it might not have been exposure to crowds but the formal, suffocating palace upbringing. Princess Margaret did not even get to attend school and make her own schoolfriends. Neither did Queen Elizabeth attend school but was home-schooled inside the palace.

The last 2 generations have been keen on early boarding school for the boys with the Queen and Prince Philip sending Charles, Andrew and Edward to boarding school aged 8. A practice adopted by Charles and Diana for William and Harry.

Interestingly William himself does not appear to be such a fan of early full time boarding school before 13 - something that mirrors Princess Anne who seems to be the spare that has done best.

They have different dangers. Their children aren't going to be kidnapped by a weirdo with sweeties.
Defensive driving skills, and what to do in the event of hijacking kidnap (à la Princess Anne) is more likely to be the skills they will be taught.

Presumably they know that from the start and are free to make their own lives and careers. They are not expected to hang around doing the boring stuff their elder sibling doesnt want to do, reliant on handouts which stop if they step out of line, as well as being vilified by the entire family.

something that mirrors Princess Anne who seems to be the spare that has done best.

Andrew was the spare. Something would have had to happen to both him and Edward for her to be in the running.

At least she saw she was so far down the order she'd better get on with her own life.

Charlotte is George's spare because of a change in the rules.

I think it's a difficult place to be. You won't get the same treatment, but if something happens to the heir before they procreate you have to be on hand to step up.

And when they do procreate you're no longer needed. So best get on with your life!