Summary of a lot of articles in Billed Bladet #16, 2010.
Written by Annelise Weimann and Ulrik Ulriksen.
Unsurprisingly almost the entire issue is devoted to QMII’s birthday celebrations.
Royal Theatre:
During the intermission QMII and PH walked around on the corridors and greeted loads of people, who were served refreshments.
The Swedish Regent Couple managed to get to the theatre just in time. They had gone by car from Stockholm. The pretty hot Princess Madeleine stayed at home, according to reports because she wouldn’t have to show herself in DK with her fiancée at her side.
The Gran Duke couple from Luxemburg also managed to be present; they had hitched a ride with the Dutch royals, who went by train. They had incidentally just handed over their royal wagon to a museum, but due to a volcano, they had to phone the museum and ask if they could borrow the wagon.
Very tragically Carina Axelsson was informed that her brother-in-law (svoger) had been shot and killed just prior to entering the Royal Theatre. His stepfather (stedfar) shot him and committed suicide afterwards. Just as horrific, her sister and their children were present in the house when the murder was committed. Add to that the ash-cloud has prevented her from going to USA to join her sister.
Among those QMII met, was Cliff Richard, who had flown in from Barbados to sing.
Oh, I guess some of you would like to know about the dresses? No? Here’s some info anyway: QMII’s dress was by Birgitte Thaulow and her fur was a silver fox. Mary was seen wearing a dress by Jesper Høvring and golden sandals. La Marie, escorted correctly by her husband Joachim, wearing the gala uniform of the army, wore a dress by Rikke Gudnitz.
Gala evening at Christiansborg:
After the show QMII went behind stage to greet the artists who had performed. One of those she greeted was Jes Dorph-Pedersen from TV2, also known as Mr News, Mr. Isn’t-he-a-nice-man and Mr. Royal News, who along Cecilie Frøkjær hosted the show. Afterwards he met and exchanged these words with PH: “What a grand show”. JDP: “Thank you, you really think so”. Using the informal you. PH smiled: “I don’t think we have become “dus” yet”. (Dus = using informal you when speaking to each other). About 1.6 million viewers watched the show on TV.
And now for dresses: QMII was wearing a dress by Birgitte Thaulow and her hair was done by her usual hairdresser, Poul Nejlund. Mary wore a dress by Uffe Frank, her hair had been done by her usual hairdresser, Søren Hedegaard. La Marie’s dress was by Rikke Gudnitz and her hair had been done by her usual hairdresser, Dennis Knudsen.
Dinner at Fredensborg:
The CP couples from Norway, Sweden and Holland dropped by Mary and Frederik in Kancellihuset, where they had a chat and a drink, before deciding to stroll the few hundred meters to the main entrance to Fredensborg, over cobbled stones mind you! – To the utter delight of royal watchers and not least the royal photographers who had lined up at the entrance.
It was a bit chilly that evening, but the ladies, three of them dressed in “asymmetric dresses”, which I understand is high fashion right not, did not seem affected by that. The entire party chatted, laughed and goofed a little around among themselves. Prince Haakon had by then finally been able to join his wife, Mette-Marit.
Prince Henrik was really in a romantic mood, not only did he present QMII with a bronze sculpture, he also wrote a very poetic song, which he delivered to his wife after the cameras had been turned off. In French of course, the language of love. Ahh, sweet, eh? The refrain of each verse ended with the words: “My heart belongs to you”.
That apparently was the emotional highlight of the evening because not only did many of the guests have a tear or two in their eyes, so did QMII, Frederik and Joachim.
A note informs us that in total of 1.5 million viewers had turned on to watch Frederik’s speech to his mother and considering it was a Friday evening at that the total population of DK is 5.4 million, that’s not bad.
Unfortunately there wasn’t room for all 241 guests in the main hall of Fredensborg. A number of guests had to dine in adjacent rooms. They could however follow what happened in regards to speeches and so on, on screens.
Mary was placed at table 26, with Prince Carl Phillip, Prince Richard, Queen Silvia and Ellen Hillingsøe, to mention some of them. Frederik was seated at table 28, along with Princess Alexia, Crown Princess Maxima, Otto Reedtz-Thott and Lene Espersen. (*) La Marie sat at table 14, with PH’s nephew Guillaume Bardin, PH’s brother Etienne de Montpezat to mention some of them. A truly French table. Prince Joachim sitting at table 18 had Crown Princess Mette-Marit as his table partner.
At each seat a little present had been placed. That was a porcelain egg, with the silhouette of QMII in gold and the date: 16. April 2010.
Now, Henrik wasn’t the only one singing in praise of QMII. A number of her girlfriends had composed a song with no less than fourteen verses! (**)
After having enjoyed a cup of coffee, the guests went to the Garden Room or had a breath of fresh air, before it was time for dancing. The singer, Lene Siel entertained. (***) Dancing went on until 02.00, where the first guests left, but most stayed and at was near dawn when the last guests left.
One or two among you may have glanced at the dresses and the magazine informs us that QMII wore a dress by Birgitte Thaulow. Mary’s dress was recycled and worn for the first time in 2003. Marie’s dress was by Rikke Gudnitz.
While mom and dad were to party, Christian and Bella went to Cirkus Arli that was at Fredensborg at the same time and here they had a great time with their nanny and a friend of Christian.
All the guests who stayed at Fredensborg left during the morning and forenoon of Saturday.
Things got a little messed up at the noon changing of the guard at Amalienborg, where QMII and her family stepped out on the balcony. The square was packed! Around 50.000 were present. The relieving detachment from the Royal Lifeguard came marching along one of the streets towards Amalienborg, just as they had announced the day before. And the police had indeed cleared a very nice route for them – along a different street. So the detachment simply got caught in the middle of the spectators! A first for the regiment. They did manage to get through just before the DRF stepped out on the balcony at 12.00 sharp. That meant they had to skip the changing of the guard and do that later.
But as the commentators said: The detachment wasn’t stopped because of malice, but because of joy.
(*) Lene Espersen is Minister of Foreign affairs as well as head of the Conservative party and the second-in-command of the government. She is also and less flattering known as “the talking cleavage”. She has faced a good deal a criticism lately and she accomplished the astounding feat of becoming one of the least popular ministers of the government. Remarkable, as foreign ministers are almost invariable among the most popular ministers in any poll for many years.
(**) It’s very common with about a zillion homemade songs at festive occasions in DK and depending on your mood, your state of soberness and age, you can have very mixed emotions about that. In fact I look very much forward to my own sons confirmation and all the songs he will be subjected to. I shall very much enjoy his embarrassment - Payback for all the nights he kept us awake as a baby.
(***) Lene Siel is certainly not a bad singer.
Those of you who were forced to watch…. I mean enjoyed The Thorn birds in the last millennium may remember this song.
IŽm so happy and relieved to be a an european when I read this!!!
This song-writing tradition is still very much alive, for confirmations, anniversaries, weddings etc. Ususally you pick a tune and then make the lyrics yourself, more or less succesfully. I have made one for one of my daughter's confirmation to the magnificent tune of Pomp and Circumstance - saved by the music! 
Linear Mode
Chevy Camaro Forum
Ford Mustang Forum
Jeep Wrangler Forum
Volkswagen Touareg Forum
Land Rover Defender Forum
