Princess Beatrice and her husband Edoardo have announced they are expecting their second child(Image: Getty Images)As Princess Beatrice announces she’s pregnant with her second child, she’ll likely start to be showered with new baby gifts.
Buckingham Palace confirmed the happy news that the late Queen’s granddaughter and her husband Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi are expecting their baby next spring.
The news will no doubt bring much-welcomed joy to the family amid Sarah Ferguson’s cancer struggle and disgraced Prince Andrew’s Royal Lodge woes.
While the Princess, 36, will likely be inundated with well wishes and presents, nothing will be able to compare to the gift she once received from her grandmother the Queen – who was known for spoiling her grandchildren.
The late Queen was believed to have splashed on Birch Hall – a seven-bedroom Georgian mansion in Surrey – that she gifted to Beatrice and her younger sister Princess Eugenie in In 1997. The sisters were just seven and nine at the time.
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Beatrice with her grandmother the Queen(Image: PA)The stunning house boasts a tennis court, swimming pool and a separate two-bedroom house on the five-acre site, so it sounds like it would have been the perfect home for the princesses and their mum Sarah Ferguson. However, Beatrice and Eugenie never moved in and it sat empty for two years.
That’s because Fergie reportedly refused to move in, saying she couldn’t afford the huge running and upkeep costs, reports the Mail. So two years after the Queen bought it, it was sold with estate agents saying the sale was “due to a change of circumstance”.
It was reported that the cash was put into a trust for the sisters to access when they were older. Speaking at the time of the second sale, Andrew Russell, from estate agents Strutt & Parker, told the Mail: “It is probably one of the very best of north Surrey’s village houses, there’s not many that come on the market.
“The house itself is a very attractive and imposing-looking property. Some of the rooms are really quite dramatic, with high ceilings and full floor-to-ceiling sash windows. The owners bought it from the trustees acting for the Queen in 1999.
“The trustees bought it in 1997 for the princesses and I imagine it was chosen because it’s a pretty house in a popular village and the gardens are a real draw, it’s more like parkland. But they never moved in.” However, it’s not the only gift that the late Queen had bestowed on Beatrice – her fifth grandchild.
Princess Beatrice and husband Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi with the Queen and the late Prince Philip on their wedding day(Image: PA)Beatrice wed her husband Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi in a scaled-back ceremony in July 2020 due to strict Covid restrictions at the time. The Queen and the late Prince Philip were among the small number of guests – and for the big day, Beatrice wore a dress straight from Her Majesty’s wardrobe.
The royal baby will be a little brother or sister for the couple’s three-year-old daughter Sienna, and Mr Mapelli Mozzi’s son and Beatrice’s stepson, eight-year-old Wolfie. Two new pictures from the family were shared to mark the announcement, with one showing blonde-haired Sienna from behind as she walks along a country lane, holding hands in the middle of her father and big brother Wolfie.
The second image was of Beatrice, as she smiled with her husband, and Buckingham Palace said in a statement: “Her Royal Highness Princess Beatrice and Mr Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi are very pleased to announce that they are expecting their second child together in early spring; a sibling for Wolfie, aged eight, and Sienna, aged three. His Majesty The King has been informed and both families are delighted with the news.”
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