Upon leaving my husbands parents house one Sunday afternoon, we got into the car to head back on our hour long drive back to the college we were attending. Two minutes down the road, he started acting weird. He kept squirming in the car, and putting his hand in his pocket, than taking it out again. I asked him if he was okay, and he replied, “sure.” Finally, ten minutes into our hour long drive home, while going 75 miles an hour down the freeway, he says, “I just can’t wait any longer. It’s burning a hole in my pocket. Will you marry me?” He proceeded to take the ring out of his pants pocket he had been sticking his hand in and out of and awkwardly tried to put the ring on my ring finger while driving. I told him to pull over for a minute. He pulled over to the side of the road, put the ring on, kissed me quickly, than got back on the road and drove the rest of the way home to our dorms. I sat admiring the ring the whole way home, it was his mom’s–who also told me when we called her later that night to tell them the news that if anything should “happen” to us–she would need the ring back. Seven years later I haven’t had to give it back.

- Tracy W., Orem, Utah

Having been through divorces, neither of us was anxious to remarry although we enjoyed each other’s company.  I wanted a man in my life, but not in my house.  His feeling was the same.  After about a year of dating, he said to me “You are someone I could marry”.  Not romantic, but realistic and I knew he meant it.  It will be our 13-year anniversary April 18.

- Pat K., Tolono, Illinois

I proposed in Las Vegas.  Besides offering some romantic spots, it would give me an excuse to take my wife back to revisit our engagement destination and give me a chance to hit up the tables.  We went to the top of the Eifel Tower in the Paris hotel.  I was very nervous and just could not get past all the people around us - I did not want to be “that Las Vegas couple.”  Plus, I kept envisioning the ring slipping out of my hand and falling 80 stories below.  So I planned on waiting till after dinner.  The ring was in my coat jacket and I took it off when we were at dinner.  A few drinks made me forget all about it and when my wife asked me for a tissue I told her to go in my jacket pocket.  She pulled out the box, and started crying and it took me a few seconds before I realized what was going on.  She said yes and the tissues came in handy!

- Mike G., Cliffside Park, New Jersey

Before I start telling the story, know first of all that it was an entire day event and included multiple videos, which I have posted on www.railroadst.com/wedding. Furthermore, although Bethany knew I was going to ask her soon, she didn’t know exactly when or how. With the help of her mom and sister, we were able to create enough doubt that she wouldn’t know immediately if I planned something elaborate. Bethany woke up Friday morning at 5:45am planning to open Cups Coffee at 6:30 and work the morning shift until 2:00pm. When she arrived at the coffee shop, Bethany first found a rose and note on the front door. The note led her to other notes around the shop at places where she usually prepares to open. The last note led her to a portable DVD player in the conference room and instructed her to watch a video that I’ve secretly filmed and edited. Getting instructions from this video to open a note by the DVD player at 7:30am (as well as finding out that her shift is covered), Bethany follows this new note’s instructions to return to her apartment with the DVD player. Walking in the door, her roommate, Deb, is ready with their bikes to go mountain biking, which she loves to do. Bethany and Deb get in the car and watch a second video on the way to the trail. After biking and hanging out together, Bethany and Deb returned to their apartment so that Bethany could get ready to have lunch. On the way to lunch, she is presented with yet another video. Although the mountain biking video alluded to the fact that Bethany would have lunch with me, upon walking into the Japanese Steakhouse and Sushi Bar, her grandmother, who flew in from Maryland, and her mom were sitting at a table ready to have lunch. After spending time with Frankie and Mel, Bethany was picked up by one of her good friends, Christa. Christa gave Bethany a journal with 240 hand-numbered pages that had questions written on random pages throughout. The driving directions were located on the same page as the questions, but in order to find them in the right order, Bethany had to answer the questions correctly so that she would be directed to the correct page number. One set of directions during the hour and fifteen minute drive had Bethany watch another video. Finally, they arrived at Lake Oconee. The guys that are in my Bible Study were lined up ready to escort Bethany down to the dock where a friend’s boat was waiting. They drove Bethany to an island on the lake, where I had previously blazed a long trail up to boulders at the top of the island, which overlooked the lake. That was where Bethany and I finally saw each other. After climbing the ladder to the top of the rock, I asked her to be my wife and she promptly said yes. After driving around on the wave-runner tied up near the island, hanging out, and eating dinner on the island, we finally drove back to Athens where she watched a final video, and was congratulated by friends and family at Cups Coffee for a small engagement party.

- Charles R., Athens, Georgia

Early in our relationship, JR took me to the opening night of a romantic Tuscan restaurant downtown. Since, he told me he occasionally got e-mails and calls from the manager about specials.
One night many months later he told me they were having a “Customer Appreciation” night with free wine and appetizers and asked if I’d like to go with him and my best friend. I agreed and when we got there, the staff seated us and thanked us for being “Valued Customers.”
There was a disposable camera and fancy letter on our table on the restaurant’s stationary and I hoped it was from JR! To my dismay, it was from the Manager thanking all the guests for coming and encouraging everyone to take pictures for the website throughout the evening. I noticed all the tables had them, not just ours.
As we enjoyed drinks and food, JR got up for the restroom. When he came back he told me he ran into someone he knew and he’d like me to meet. He led me downstairs to another part of the restaurant but stopped in the middle of the floor. He whispered, “this is all facade, it’s all for you” before he got down on his knee and popped the question. Everyone around clapped and took pictures. “What good timing that everyone had cameras!” I thought.
As JR stood, he turned me around for an even bigger surprise and I saw that many of the flashes were coming from one big group of cameras behind us - our families and friends who had been hiding and witnessed the whole event.
As it turns out, all those letters on the tables were instructions for the customers to wait for the moment to take our pictures and commemorate the proposal! We have hundreds of pictures of every second and every angle of the proposal. We enjoyed the rest of the night celebrating in a private room with everyone.
I still can’t believe that JR got an ENTIRE restaurant staff AND patrons to play along with this “customer appreciation night” just for me.

- J.R., Fort Worth, Texas

My fiance has been handcuffed and detained for an hour by patrol officers before I met her because someone switched her tags with some from a stolen car.
I decided to go with this theme for the proposal. I have a friend who is Chief Deputy for our County Sheriff’s department. He lined it up so an officer would pull us over at a certain spot at my workplace parking lot. He made us both get out of the car and walk backwards. He then instructed me get on my knees at which time I turned and pulled out the ring and dropped to one knee.
The best part about it is we got it on video from the patrol car.
She loved it. She was laughing the whole time and I thought she knew what was going on, but she didn’t have a clue. Now we have a great story to tell.

- Jake F., Wilmington, North Carolina

It was still winter in the mountains, and a beautiful spring day in the valley. I suggested to my girlfriend that we take a hike in the mountains that still had a bit of snow coverage on the beautiful day. We went up into the mountains and the setting was perfect, there was just enough snow for my plan to work. We continued to walk, holding hands an enjoying the day when I suggested we make snowmen. I suggested she make a female and I would make a male snowman. After we finished I said we should name them. I coerced her into naming her snowman “Mary” and I named mine “Will”. Then I said to her, ” It is so nice for the four of us to be here ‘Will, you, Mary, Me”. I said it again this time getting down on my knee holding out a ring. After she said yes and we hugged, she looked at me and said, “Oh, I get it!”

- Barrett B., Ogden, Utah

My husband and I were at the Dairy queen 34 years ago, and while we were eating hamburgers, he pulled out a beautiful set of engagement rings, I was totally surprise and happy.

- Gail C., Chandler, Texas

Amanda and I had been dating a year and half when I proposed. We already knew that we were going to get married, and I had been planning for about two months. She had always told me that she was more excited about a good proposal than the ring or the money spent, she wanted to have a great story. So I knew that I had to go all out.
The proposal began Friday October 5, 2007, at 5 a.m. when I tried to wake her up to go on a surprise road trip that I had planned that night because I couldn’t “sleep”; she told me to go away and let her sleep. She is not a morning person so this was a problem that I had foreseen. Eventually, she finally, though unhappily, agreed and we set off in the car after two blatant lies that we would not be taking many pictures and I promised that I would not propose.
After five hours in the car we arrived at a boat dock in Thousand Islands, N.Y. We took a ferry across the St. Lawrence River to Boldt Castle on Heart Island. This was not unusual for us, since we have quite frequently road tripped to random places, and had visited castles before since she has a love affair with castles. That previous year, for Valentine’s Day, I had taken her to the Biltmore Estate, which is quite close to a castle. Unfortunately she found out about that which taught how sneaky I would have to be for the proposal.  Anyways, at this point she still had no idea the proposal was coming; she just assumed we were on a very cool date though she was still upset about having to get up so early.
Well, there we took tons of pictures and she thought that this castle was the culmination of the trip and that we were going home, but little did she know that we were not rushing to go home. Instead, there was surprise stop number two! We went back to the boat dock and I ran to the car to get some pre-packed duffel bags. She kept asking me questions about why we had bags and where we were going. The boat captain then came up and said hello to Robert by name, a small mistake, I think this is where she began to put the pieces together because she found it very odd. He led us to a private yacht that we boarded. She was getting nervous now because she had no idea where we going yet again. After almost an hour boat ride, we began approaching Singer Castle on Dark Island. As we got closer, we saw a sign on the side of the entrance that read “closed for today.” This was when she really started putting the pieces together and realized we had brought bags because we were staying there. I had rented the entire castle, and its island, for the night for us.
We were then taken to the “Royal Suite.” We had a few minutes to get relaxed and get ready for a tour and dinner. Throughout this time I kept having to dodge questions and lie constantly that I was not going to propose.  Since the castle was literally ours for the day, we had a three hour personal tour in places guests can never usually dream of going. We got to sit in chairs hundreds of years old and go in secret passageways. We were treated like a king and queen for the day. It was beyond amazing.
Then we went upstairs to wait for dinner. We got dressed up slightly; however, we looked horrible a little off because, in my hurry and nervousness, I forgot to pack some of her clothes and MY SHOES! (I ate a fancy dinner in a suit, at a castle, while wearing flip-flops) But we made due and ate a fancy dinner in the one of the grand dining rooms. After this, we were “supposed” to take pictures in the various rooms of the castle and do our own touring, but when we went upstairs to change, she noticed that there was an extra door in our suite, which had been locked and shut before, but was now slightly open. I was trying to get her to take a picture with me in front of the door and, in theory, nonchalantly turn on the video recording of the camera.
However, she ran over to see what was in it before I had a chance to set it up and found that it was another bedroom. The room was covered with flowers, a thousand yellow and pink daisies. This had special meaning to her because in her favorite episode of “Gilmore Girls,” Max proposed to Lorelai with a thousand yellow daisies. At this point she knew, and I got down on one knee and told her how much I loved her and asked her to marry me.
She excitedly accepted and then we proceeded to call everyone we knew, at 11pm. We were so busy calling people we never took pictures till the next morning. In the morning, we got up early, once again around five, and we took tons of pictures to remember our castle experience, we ate breakfast in the dining hall and went home where her family had a surprise engagement party waiting for us!

- Robert W., Lynchburg, Virginia

I met Zach six years ago when he went to prom with my cousin. We ended up dating for about three months till I went away to college.  He finished his senior year in high school and we ended up at the same college where he stayed for six months until going to Florida.  His dream was to play football for The University of Florida. We didn’t talk to each other for 4 years.  We finally got the nerve to talk to each other on January 17th 2006.  We talked everyday till he came home.  He put aside his dream to move back home to be with me in the Winter of 2006.  This past December he took me to Disney World for our anniversary.  On December 17th we stood in from of Cinderella’s Castle  taking pictures of the fireworks behind the castle.  The fireworks started to go off & I was trying to concentrate and get a good picture when Zach asked me if he could ask me a question.  I snapped back at him, “What?” Right then two fireworks shot up from the sides and met at the top.  Right as they met the song “When you wish upon a star” was playing and he wrapped his arms around me and asked “Will you marry me?”  We had to sit down because his legs were shaking.  I sat on the ground crying and smiling at the same time.  Two minutes later he said “So is that a yes?

- Alianna A., Ashport, Ohio