New Swedish Royal Baby!

A New Little Prince was born today in Sweden!!!

HRH Prince Gabriel Carl Walther, Duke of Dalarna was born Thursday, August 31st at 11:22 AM. Weighing 3400 gram (Approx. 7.5 pounds) and 49 cm long. (Approx. 19.2 inches) The Prince is 6th in line to the Swedish Throne. Both mother and baby are doing well.

Thursday 31st

• Birth of Prince at Danderyd hospital in Stockholm
• 11:22 AM
•  Prince Carl Philip press conference at hospital 
• 3:00 PM
• Cannon Fire to mark the Birth 
• 6:00 PM
• 21 gun salute from Skeppsholmen saluting station as well as from Boden, Härnösand, Karlskrona and Göteborg.

Monday 4th 

•  King Carl Gustaf holds Cabinet meeting, with Princess Victoria
• 11:15 AM
• Announce the name and baby's title
• HRH Prince Gabriel Carl Walther, Duke of Dalarna 
• Te Deum Service at Royal Palace Chapel
• 12:15 PM
• Attended by Royal Family
• King, Queen, Victoria, Daniel and Carl Philip 

• Congratulatory lists at the Royal Palace
• 1-4 PM
• Well-wisher can sign list to send their congratulations to the couple

Princess Diana's Final Six Charities

Princess Diana had over 100 patronages during her marriage. When she divorced in 1996, Diana resigned from almost all of her patronages, keeping only 6 until her death in 1997. The following are the list of Princess Diana's final charities:

Great Ormond Street Hospital 
Great Ormond Street Hospital is a children's hospitals in London.

• Queen Victoria was Patron (1852-?)
• Princess Mary, the Princess Royal was Vice Patron (?-?) and President (?-?)
• Queen was Patron (1965- 2022)
• Diana was president (1989-1997)

Royal Marsden Hospital 
The Royal Marsden Hospital is a specialist cancer treatment hospital in London. The hospital focuses on cancer diagnosis, treatment, research and education.

• The Queen was Patron (1952 -2022)
• Diana was President (1989-1997)
• Prince William is President (2007-Present)

English National Ballet 
English National Ballet is a classical ballet company. It is one of the 4 major ballet companies in the UK.

• Princess Margret was Patron (1976-1989) 
• Diana was Patron (1989-1997)
• Prince Andrew was Patron (2001-2019)
• Princess Beatrice is patron of the English National Ballet School (2015-present)

Centrepoint  
Centrepoint is a London based charity that works with homeless people (aged 16–25), to provide housing, support services. Such as Healthcare (physical and mental), education, mentoring, training, employment and teaching life skills.

The Charity also works to influence government policy and create more local and national support for the homeless community.

• Diana was Patron (1992 - 1997)
• Prince William is Patron (2005-Present)
• His was 1st official patronage
• Kitty Spencer is an Ambassador (2016 - Present)
• Princess Diana's niece

NAT (National Aids Trust)
NAT is the UK’s policy and campaign charity dedicated to transforming society’s response to HIV. They hope by shaping attitudes and challenging injustice, they can change the lives of people with HIV.

The charity was founded in 1987 by the UK's Department of Health, to help deal with public opinion about HIV. The charity is a non-government organization and does not receive any government funding. NAT does not provide direct support services to people living with HIV, instead of focusing on creating campaigns and policy.

• Diana was Patron (1991-1997)

The Leprosy Mission (England and Wales)

The Leprosy Mission is an international organization dedicated to providing treatment, care and support services to those afflicted with Leprosy &  They also work to combat the stigma of Leprosy. Diana was patron of the England and Wales branch of the organization.  

• Diana was Patron from (1990-1997)

Prince Michael, & Princess Anne - Birthday Reply (2017)

Prince Micheal of Kent 

The first reply is from Prince Micheal of Kent, the Queen's cousin. I had written to Prince Michael for his 75th birthday in July. I had written a few times before, but this is the 1st reply I have ever gotten from either Prince Micheal of his wife.

The address on the envelope it handwritten, which is very lovely. This is the 3rd time I've gotten a handwritten envelope, and it all ways makes the reply even more special.

It is interesting to see that this letter was sent by 2nd class mail. All my other letters from the UK Royals have been sent 1st class. But it didn't cause any delay in arriving.

Inside is a letter from Miss Elsa Meagher, the Personal Assistant to the Private Secretary of Prince & Princess Michael of Kent. On the top of the letter and the back of the envelope is a simplified version of Prince Michael's Coat of Arms.

Here is a close up of the simplified coat of arms. This is very interesting because it appears to be a hand-drawn coat of arms. It is missing some of the details of the Prince's coat of arms, but I like the ruggedness of it.

The letter is an interesting size. It's in-between the normal letter and half size.  You can see it here compared to our two other replies we got today.

Princess Anne

The 2nd reply is from Princess Anne, who celebrated her 67th birthday earlier this month.

The envelope is again similar to what we usually see from the British Royals. But, what is interesting is the double postmark.

It's a little hard to make out the 2nd postmark on this envelope, but it says, "Royal Mail Supports Mental Health Awareness."

Each year or so, the Royal Mail picks a "charity of the year" to officially support. In May, they announced their new charity of the year is Action for Children (Duchess Kate's Patronage). It is part of the Royal Mail's new focus on mental health.

The charity was chosen by Royal Mail employees. The two runner ups were Mental Health UK and Mind, which the Royal Mail will still continue to support.

The Royal Mail is also an official sponsor of William, Kate & Harry's Heads Together campaign.

The letter is from Mrs. Isabella Ward, Princess Anne's office secretary. It pretty standard for what we see from Princess Anne's office.

Also Check Out:
Other Replies
Writing to the Royals
British Royal Postmarks

August Q&A (2017)

As always, post your Royal Questions & I will get to them as soon as possible.

Question 1: How do you display your cards that you receive from the Royal Family? Is framing them ok to do?

Answer: We went into this some in May 2017 Q&A #10. Framing them is okay, but you have to worry about fading, and ink possibly changing colours. I have my letters in binders.

Question 2: How about Sweden? Are they responding? 

Answer: Sweden responds occasionally. In the few years I've written to them, I've only gotten 2 replies.  You can see my Replies from the Sweden Royals here.

Question 3: Have you written to either the Bhutan or Japanese royal family? If so, how would you go about addressing them?

Answer: I have written to the Bhutan Royals, never got a reply. I don't think I've written to the Japan Royals before, and have never seen a reply from them.

If by "addressing them" you mean, what are their address? You can find the addresses for the different royal families here.

If you mean how would you call them in your letters:

The King & Queen of Bhutan are both HM (His or Her Majesty), the other Royal Family HRH (His or Her Royal Highness). So, there isn't anything different than other royals. You could address them anyway people might normally address that royal:

Their Majesties
TM The King and Queen
TM King and Queen of Bhutan
King Jigme Khesar & Queen Jetsun
etc.

The Emperor and Empress of Japan are HIM (His or Her Imperial Majesty), the rest of the family HIH (His or Her Imperial Highness). There are a lot of different ways to address them:

Their Imperial Majesty
TIH The Emperor and Empress
TIH Emperor and Empress of Japam
Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko
etc.

Question 3: Do you know anyone who has ever received a personal reply from the Duke or Duchess of Cambridge? I know sometimes people get them from Camilla.

Answer: I don't know of anyone who has gotten a personal reply from the Duke or Duchess of Cambridge. What Camilla does is very unique.