Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s Christmas Plans Have Been Cemented, and One Person Won’t Be Happy About It

Christmas is just shy of two months away (!), and plans are being firmed up, including the itinerary of the Sussex family, comprised of Prince Harry, Meghan Markle, and their two kids, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet. Harry and Meghan haven’t spent the traditional royal family Christmas at Sandringham since stepping back as working members of the royal family in 2020, and royal expert Dr. Tessa Dunlop said, of a possible change in course, “don’t hold your breath,” she said.

“Just as Harry was a no-show at Balmoral this summer, it is unlikely that he’ll grace Sandringham with his presence,” she told The Mirror. Alluding to rumors that Harry is looking to buy property in the U.K. after his and Meghan’s eviction from their U.K. home, Frogmore Cottage, earlier this year, Dunlop continued “Far from buying a penthouse near London, it doesn’t even look like King Charles will get a Christmas cuddle” with Archie and Lili. 

Dunlop added that it looks like, if Harry does buy a home in his native U.K., he will buy it on his own dime rather than depend on the Crown. “The Sussexes are going to house hunt in and around London, at least so goes the rumor,” she said. “Despite his father owning more homes than you or I have hot dinners—try counting them—by all accounts Harry’s mooted return to the U.K. will not see him lean on his father’s estate. Rather, the pair will branch out and buy somewhere of their own, in a mission driven by homesick Harry.” She added “Just as Camilla was the evil adulterer until we discovered a gentle, and even pretty, Queen, Harry is being curated as the little lost boy, a square peg in an American hole who wants to come home. We Brits want to believe Harry can’t manage without us, that he misses the brother he has told us he was never close to, the father he is no longer speaking to, and the country he slammed.”

Dunlop is still skeptical the U.K. house hunt is happening at all: “His 2023 U.K. pitstops have included a very expensive legal battle with the British press, a blink-and-you’ll-miss-him Coronation moment, and a charity event pre-Invictus Games in Germany,” she said. “These are not the actions of a man who is about to start house hunting in the U.K. I’m sure Harry would like a bolthole in London—it’s his home city, after all—but it makes no sense for the safety-obsessed Sussexes to invest in a private property when they can bunk up with cousins on the Windsor estate or stay in one of London’s working palaces where the security brief is on tap. Rather, it is we the British public who are missing Harry. Let’s face it, this new, more discreet Duke and Duchess who keep themselves to themselves in America, popping up occasionally to do good works, is a bit boring.”

Though the King may be disappointed that the Sussexes won’t be joining the rest of the royal family for Christmas (although, with the current state of relations between the family, there’s no way this comes as a surprise), royal author Dr. Ed Owens said that Charles is ready to make peace but feels that the Sussexes need to take the first steps towards it. “He [Charles] is demonstrating he is ready to reconcile and that ultimately, the onus is on them to make a decision as to whether they want to heal the wounds that have opened up between them and the rest of the royal family,” he told GB News, per The Daily Express. “The King has done that quite successfully so far. He’s held the moral high ground, he’s presented himself as a conciliator. That is the best way to maintain his reputation as a public figure.” Owens added that, whether right or wrong, Charles shows that he’s open to mending fences through stories that go out to the press from the Palace, and that he “very much wants to keep the door open to Harry and Meghan, should they decide they want to return,” he said.