Oh Wow, we’re engaged!!!

On Friday of last week, I decided I would surprise my Jelly, by proposing to her at work, without her having a clue that it was coming. This is how the proposal played out………

It all started with a visit to my future father in law, Jim Phillips on the Tuesday of that week. I emailed him the night before to say there was something I wished to ask him face to face. I left work early on the Tuesday, ensuring that my “Find my Friend” was switched off on my phone, just in case Claire wanted to see where I was.

Upon arriving at Jim and Sue’s I felt a little bit nervous, Jim was sat in the conservatory awaiting my arrival. He had a list of questions he had prepared to ask me, to see if I was suitable material for his eldest daughter, luckily I passed the test, and managed to avoid answering loads of the questions lol.

We had previously discussed about having Claire’s Grandmothers engagement ring as her ring, and it was a ring that Claire loved, it was simple, not too big but still classy. The only problem was the ring was quite thin, and we didn’t know if it was possible to resize it to fit Claire’s finger, which I’d previously made a note of the size back in February!! So I left it with Jim to see if he could get it resized and cleaned up.

I then made my journey home, just checking to make sure Claire wasn’t on the same road on my way home. When it was too late, I realised she was on the same road as me coming in the opposite direction, would she see me, would it raise loads of questions, that needed a few white lies, luckily she hadn’t seen me, and my managed to divert on the way home to ensure we didn’t pass each other….that was close.

Jim managed to get the ring resized on the Wednesday, and I then left work early on the Thursday to pick the ring up from them.

Again, this was all done in secrecy and Claire did not have a clue.

Now, I didn’t want to turn up at her work place, in my work clothes, so I smuggled my new suit that had only been worn at previous weddings into the boot of my car, making the excuse that I was going to get it dry cleaned in Frimley as there was a special offer on at the local dry cleaners.

I left work on Friday at lunchtime, all geared up for the big event, however at this stage none of my family knew what I was planning to do, so to correct this, I popped in to see Emma & Niamh on the way over to my parents, and showed Emma the ring. Niamh wasn’t bothered one way or the other, but she’s only 10 months so I’ll excuse her for that.

I then popped by my parents, who were surprised to see me. Mum was doing the ironing and said she would iron my pink shirt that had got a bit creased in the boot of the car. They were pleased for me, which was great, and think Claire is a great girl. I was going to buy some flowers from Marks and Spencers or somewhere in Guildford, but mum persuaded me to buy some flowers from the stall at the bottom of Castle Street. Glad I did, as the lady on the stall made up a fantastic bunch of flowers after I told her I was going to propose to my Jelly with them.

All I needed now was something to go with the flowers, so everyone could toast our happiness. What was Claire’s favourite drink……….Prosecco, so I popped in to Tesco’s on the way into Guildford and picked up their finest bottle of Prosecco, all I needed now was for everything to go according to plan and for Jelly to say YES.

This is when everything started to go drastically wrong, not once but twice……

I arrived at the reception of Stackhouse Poland, and was greeted by the receptionist. I said I was here to see Claire Phillips and it was a surprise and she wasn’t to know i was here, as i was going to ask her to marry me. The receptionist said okay. She then rang somebody upstairs asking for them to come down and meet me. When she put the phone down, I asked that wasn’t Claire you were speaking to was it, and she confirmed it was. I said “NO, i don’t want to see her here, i want to see her at her desk, where can i hide?’ You can hide in the toilet opposite she suggested, so I hid in there until the coast was clear.

In the meantime, Claire had come down and the receptionist went on to tell her there was a Strange man in the toilet. Claire was rightly thinking, well why have you asked me down here to sort out some mad axe murderer hiding in the loo’s. She told Claire to get him out of the loo, and Claire said no way, and wanted to get somebody from upstairs to help out. At this point the receptionist knocked on the door, me thinking that this meant the coast was clear for me to go upstairs. To my shock and horror she was standing there.

In that split second Claire knew why I was there, and the element of surprise had been lost forever. I said you need to go back upstairs, and she said no way, you’re not going to embarrass me in front of everyone, however I managed to persuade her to go back upstairs and I followed shortly afterwards.

And the rest as they say is history.

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