I just finished watching Natedeug’s “Chronology Cut” in my marathon leading up to Episode IX, and I found that his execution of keeping the reveal intact was solid. In his edit, Obi-Wan and Yoda are standing at the window while Padme is on the operating table. The medical droid informs them that they are losing her, and will need to operate to save the babies. Bail says “Babies?” and the droid elaborates that she is carrying twins. Obi-Wan walks further down, looks back at Padme and covers his mouth, Yoda sighs and looks down, then the film cuts to the three discussing what to do with the children. After that, Padme’s funeral on Naboo is the rest of what we see of her.

By doing this, Luke and Leia aren’t actually seen being born, so the Leia reveal is still preserved for RotJ whether the viewer chooses to watch in chronological order or in machete order. Luke’s identity will still be obvious in ANH without him explicitly being named in ROTS, especially after he is left with on Tatooine. However, Bail still says he will take the girl in this edit, so I’d imagine that were one to use it to introduce someone who has not seen the films, it’s not hard to discern that Leia is the other baby if they’ve been paying attention and know who she is, and/or if they know that Bail is the senator of Alderaan. Still, I thought the edit was executed quite well.

Perhaps if you still wanted to work in Leia remembering Padme, you could do something like that in conjunction with, instead of cutting to Padme’s funeral, something in which she lives and is seen on Alderaan? HAL9000’s edit uses a shot from “The Other Boleyn Girl” that does exactly that after the Tantive III lands on Alderaan; it doesn’t fit perfectly but it is convincing enough, in my opinion. Since you plan to do a purist canon cut as well, that shouldn’t offend anyone who wants Padme to die within the film instead of between films.