Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan Welcome Daughter August With a Sweet Family Photo and an Inspirational Letter

The couple welcomed their firstborn child Max in 2015

By Zach Johnson Aug 28, 2017 5:30 PMTags

There's another birth announcement in your Facebook feed.

Mark Zuckerberg announced Monday that Priscilla Chan, his wife of five years, has given birth to their second child. "Priscilla and I are so happy to welcome our daughter August!" he wrote. Their little girl joins big sister Max Zuckerberg, whose birth was announced in December 2015. In addition to sharing an adorable family photo via Facebook (where else?), Mark published a letter that he and Priscilla wrote to August "about the world we hope she grows up in." The letter also touched on the couple's shared hope that their newborn "doesn't grow up too fast."

The couple wrote a similar letter after Max was born. At the time, they pledged to donate 99 percent of their Facebook shares—valued at $45 billion—to the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, focused on education and health; the money will be donated over the course of their lifetimes.

Mark wrote the letter to August, which he and Priscilla signed.

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"Welcome to the world! Your mom and I are so excited to see who you will become. When your sister was born, we wrote a letter about the world we hoped she and now you will grow up in—a world with better education, fewer diseases, stronger communities, and greater equality. We wrote that with all the advances in science and technology, your generation should live dramatically better lives than ours, and we have a responsibility to do our part to make that happen. Even though headlines often focus on what's wrong, we still believe these positive trends will win out," Mark, 33, began. "We're optimists about your generation and the future."

"But rather than write about growing up, we want to talk about childhood," Mark said. "The world can be a serious place. That's why it's important to make time to go outside and play."

Mark, the fifth richest person in the world, wants August and her sister to ease into adulthood. "You will be busy when you're older, so I hope you take time to smell all the flowers and put all the leaves you want in your bucket now. I hope you read your favorite Dr. Seuss books so many times you start inventing your own stories about the Vipper of Vipp," he wrote. "I hope you ride the carousel with Max until you've tamed every color horse. I hope you run as many laps around our living room and yard as you want. And then I hope you take a lot of naps. I hope you're a great sleeper. And I hope even in your dreams you can feel how much we love you."

Most importantly, he wrote, "Childhood is magical."

"You only get to be a child once, so don't spend it worrying too much about the future," wrote Mark, who co-founded Facebook 13 years ago. "You've got us for that, and we'll do everything we possibly can to make sure the world is a better place for you and all children in your generation. August, we love you so much and we're so excited to go on this adventure with you. We wish you a life of joy, love and the same hope you give us. Love, Mom and Dad."

Zuckerberg did not share August's birth details in his Facebook update.