As Prince George approaches his 13th birthday, Prince William has reiterated that he is determined to give his own children the “normal” childhood that few previous generations of the Royal Family will have experienced.
“I do try and stick to school timetables as best as possible,” he said while appearing on Eugene Levy’s Reluctant Traveller documentary, “Most days we’re in and out of school doing pick-ups and drop-offs.”
He added: “Getting the balance of work and family life right is really important because, for me, the most important thing in my life is family.”
While, for example, King Charles spent much of his childhood in the care of nannies while his parents were undertaking royal duties overseas, William and Kate are regular sights at their children’s sports matches and plays.
Daily Beast journalist Tom Sykes, who shared details via his Substack, spoke to parents connected to Thomas’s Battersea in London and Lambrook in Berkshire – the two schools attended by the Prince and Princess of Wales's children. They have witnessed a side of the Prince and Princess of Wales that differs greatly from the public image seen by most people.
“I went to the house for a kid’s birthday party, and [William and Kate] were the ones organising the games and playing rounders,” a parent whose children go to Lambrook told Sykes. “Any of us lot would get an entertainer in and sit in the house drinking rosé.”
Writing in The Sun, Emily Andrews said that William and Kate's "hands-on approach" at parties left fellow parents "gently amused".
A friend of the royal couple also gave an insight into the couple's parenting style. They said: “The prince and princess have put in boundaries to give their children an incredibly normal upbringing in the circumstances. How they decide when they show up at events is carefully balanced. The prince has always wanted to give them the normal upbringing that he didn’t have.”
Prince George’s childhood is quite unlike that of previous heirs to the throne. As he embarks upon his teenage years, he has enjoyed far more privacy than even his father had, and has spent more time with both of his parents.
“If I can’t give my time to my children … I worry about their future,” Prince William said in a 2016 interview.
“I think royal duty is extremely important. It’s part of the fabric of what the royal family and any future monarch has … I want to bring my children up as good people with the idea of service and duty to others as very important.
“But it’s about finding your own way at the right time, and if you’re not careful, duty can sort of weigh you down an awful lot at a very early age, and I think you’ve got to develop into the duty role.”
While in many ways, William and Kate have worked hard to make George’s life as “normal” as possible, there are some ways in which it is quite unlike that of the average British teenager: "None of our children have phones, which we're very strict about,” William told Eugene Levy. Instead, he said, the entire family spends time together: "We sit and chat. It's really important,” he said.
With both the King and the Princess of Wales receiving cancer diagnoses in the past couple of years, there is a lot to talk about: "We choose to communicate a lot more with our children,” William told a Brazilian news outlet.
"Every family has its own difficulties and its own challenges. It's very individual and sort of moment-dependent as to how you deal with those problems."
