Princess Anne has always been known for her no-nonsense personality, but on one Sandringham Christmas outing, her remarks may have rubbed one admirer the wrong way. Longtime royal photographer Arthur Edwards shared the story during a recent episode of the Sun's “Royal Exclusive” program.

Edwards told how Princess Anne's daughter Zara Tindall (then Zara Phillips) had just had her tongue pierced and everyone was “desperate” to get a photo of the much talked about accessory. She did not mention when the Christmas in question was, but given the timeline of when Zara got her piercing, the incident must have happened on Christmas 1998.

“We were all desperate to get a picture of this tongue,” she said. So we were driving back to London, and I got a call from the office saying, 'Do you have any pictures of Princess Anne? Edwards recalled.

“I said, no, no, this is about Zara Phillips and Stud,” he continued. But as it turns out, the biggest Christmas story of the year was not about tongue piercing.

“She got a bouquet of flowers from Princess Anne,” he said. In contrast, the always frank Princess Anne was wearing a very festive red and green checkered jacket that year.

“That was the story,” Edwards said. 'It was Lady Catherine and William, their children, and the king and queen. But somebody somewhere took a picture.”

The royal photographer did not mention how fans received Princess Anne's comments, but Matt Wilkinson, the Sun's royal editor, did mention how people from around the world waited outside St. Mary Magdalene Church to catch a glimpse of the family on Christmas Day “Amazingly, people come in from all over the world to see the family at five o'clock in the morning,” he said. He said, “Amazingly, people have been there since five or six in the morning, and people come from all over the United States and Canada.”

Hopefully, Ann's bouquet maker didn't fly across the pond that year, but something tells me that she probably didn't care what Ann said.

As for this year's Christmas Walk, see this page to see who will be the star of the show at Sandringham (my money is on Prince Louis).