TRADITIONAL
Take her to New York, Paris, San Francisco or Las Vegas and propose to her at the top of a landmark skyscraper with the twinkling lights of the city below.
After a meal of your favorite take-out Chinese food, propose with a fortune in the cookie asking her to marry you. Robbins Bros. will even supply the “Will You Marry Me?” cookie. Szechwan Beef or General Tso’s not included.
Take her for a walk on the beach and draw a heart in the sand and write, “Will you marry me?” in the center. Write it ahead of time and fill the heart with candles and rose petals. Just makes sure the tide is going out and not coming in.
Treat her to a decadent breakfast at a five-star hotel, and tell her that you couldn’t wait until evening to ask her to marry you.
Purchase a perfect, single stem red rose and place the engagement ring in the center. Kneel down and ask her to smell the rose.
Pop the question at the location where you met or had your first date. Depending on where it is, you could bring a bottle of champagne with you.
Arm yourself with a good supply of rose petals then sneak into her house or office. Arrange the petals to read, “Marry me” on the bed, the floor or another flat place.
If you can sing or play the guitar/piano/accordion without making dogs howl, you can create a musical proposal. Compose a ballad or folk song, or pop the question with some pop music. If you’ve found the words but can’t carry a tune, hire a local singer or band to perform the proposal. If you can carry a tune but can’t compose, go to your favorite karaoke place and sing your favorite love song. Then, as the song ends, ask her to come up to the front, and propose in front of everyone!
Plant your: proposal as a message in a bottle and partially cover it with sand on the beach. Take her on a sunset walk and “discover” it together.
Carefully open a box of Cracker Jacks, steam open the prize packet and place the real engagement ring in and re-glue packet and box. Casually give her the box of Cracker Jacks during a movie and watch closely as she opens the prize.
Hire a car service that has classic cars, such as vintage Rolls Royces, and drive around to romantic areas for an hour. Have the driver stop at a place that holds special meaning and propose. Then, spend the second hour of your elegant drive cuddling and enjoying your first hour as an engaged couple. Bring the champagne (not to be shared with the driver).
Have the engagement ring store place the ring you selected in a case, with her name and “Will you marry me?” on the tag. Then, invite her to the store “just to look” and have the associate walk you to the case with this special proposal, followed by champagne and cake.
Propose in the lounge of a romantic restaurant over a champagne toast. The next big surprise will come when you are seated at your table, and you pre-arranged to have her closest friends and family members there to celebrate in the engagement dinner.
Take her to a favorite restaurant and arrange (ahead of time) for the waiter to hand her a “special” menu. When she opens it, she’ll read your proposal.
Hire a friend to take photos of you both just for fun. Then, surprise her by getting down on one knee and proposing. You’ll have photos you’ll both cherish forever.
Make her birthday one she’ll never forget. Give her a beautifully wrapped giant box. Inside, place another wrapped up box. Inside this one, another, even smaller wrapped box. (You get the idea) After unwrapping the multiple boxes she’ll get to the small box that contains the ring. Incidentally, the occasion doesn’t have to be her birthday.
Bring her one rose each night, for 11 nights. On the 12th night, give her a rose with a card inside that asks you to marry her. Bend down on one knee and put the engagement ring on her finger.
Invite her over for a Scrabble game and set up the board in advance. Arrange the tiles to spell out your message. To keep them from falling out of the spaces on a traditional board, you can glue them on. Have her reach into the letter bag for her engagement ring. She’ll be at a loss for words.
Propose during a romantic gondola ride: Venice, Italy, Naples in Long Beach, California, or at the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas.
Buy a beautifully boxed assortment of fine chocolates. Remove some of the chocolates and replace them with her boxed engagement ring.
Plan a treasure hunt with the clues pointing to you, hiding, on a bended knee with the engagement ring. Set up the search by hiding a number of small surprises such as candy, flowers and a CD as the first few stops along the way.
Buy a small book of romantic poetry, leave the first few pages intact and glue the rest together. Carve a cutout the size of the ring or a heart through the glued pages. Attach the engagement ring into the empty space. Write your own special poem, insert it into the first page of the book and present it to her.
Propose at Robbins Bros. We’ll arrange for your ring to be displayed prominently in one of our jewelry cases surrounded by roses. We’ll even supply a bottle of champagne.
Consider a holiday theme around Christmas, Easter or the Fourth of July. Use the magic of these celebrations to create a “halo effect”. Stash the box in her stocking or right under the tree. Or adorn the tree with lots of lights and garlands but only one ornament: a velvet ring box tied up with festive holiday ribbons. On Easter, give her a basket and hide plastic eggs in the backyard, one of which has the ring inside. During Fourth of July fireworks, pop the question during the finale.
For the right kind of woman, be her Knight in Shining Armor, literally. Rent the suit at a local costume shop or borrow one from the theatre department at a college or high school in your area. Arrange to ride up to her house or workplace on a white horse.
NON-TRADITIONAL
Propose during a camping trip to a picturesque location. When it’s time to go to sleep, complain that there must be a rock or something underneath you, then pull out the ring and make your proposal.
Go on an afternoon fishing trip. Arrange for a scuba diver to lie waiting somewhere offshore. Bait her hook and throw it in first. Signal the scuba diver to swim in, attach a clamshell with the ring inside to the end of her line, and then give it a tug. When she reels the line in, she will notice the clam. Remove it from the hook, open it and give her the ring.
Hire a magician to perform with the rabbits, the doves, the scarves and all the usual. As the last trick, he can make her engagement ring appear from behind her ear. It’ll be a truly magic moment.
If you are both golfers, have a ball imprinted with “marry me”. Give her the ball to put on the tee, but have her “inspect” it first. Then, open the golf ball-shaped ring box when you get down on bended knee.
E-mail an animated graphic of a diamond or create a website page, with your “Will you marry me?” message. Try to time her opening of the e-mail/visit to the website to when you can be there in person.
If it’s the wintertime and you’re not living in Florida or another warm climate, scratch your proposal into the frost on her car’s windshield or build a snowman and put the ring box in his stick arms.
Flying together? Join a different mile-high club. For this one, you need to let the flight attendants know of your plan ahead of time. And that plan is to tell your girlfriend you are going up front to get some water/more peanuts. Then, ask the attendant to make this announcement: “Hello everyone. We hope you are enjoying your flight today. We have a special guest on board today, (your girlfriend’s name here) sitting in seat number X, row X. Go ahead and come on up here! Then, you’ll get on the microphone, and tell her how much you love her, then propose 30,000 feet in the sky! Have the crew pass around bubbly (7-up will do) and celebrate with everybody on board.
Write your “Will you marry me” message in sunscreen on your stomach, so that your tan will “stencil in” the words.
Host a wine tasting party at your house, with all the bottles covered up. After the “blind” tasting, have her unwrap the bottles to reveal to everyone what type of wine they were drinking. She’ll be drunk with happiness when she reads the hand-made label (that you made) on one of the bottles that says, “Will you marry me?”
Have a professional videographer follow you for an hour, under the premise that he or she is earning credits towards a film degree and needs to get footage of a couple somewhere like the park or a beach. As the camera is taping, get down on one knee and propose. You’ll have this precious moment caught on film, to share with your family & friends.
If you attend a place of worship, walk up with her to the altar following a service. With the pastor, priest or rabbi there (and in on the surprise) tell her you want to stand at this location with her when you become husband and wife. Then get on one knee and propose.
Consider your mutual interests. If you are both avid skiers or snowboarders, propose at the top of the black diamond run. If you both like to hike, do it on the trail in a beautiful scenic location. Baseball players? Give her a diamond on the diamond.
Plow a romantic message in a field. Just make sure it’s your field or you ask the farmer first.
If you have a talking bird or parrot, train it to say, “Will you marry me?” Make a big show with the new words he has learned — at a romantic moment. Of course, keep in mind, the bird may give you away before you’re ready.
EVENT
If she wakes up each morning to the clock radio, arrange for an ad on her usual station at just the right time so she hears your proposal when she wakes up in the morning. Try to be at her door (or beside her) when she hears your public proposal, and have the diamond in hand.
In a variation of the above, have the DJ of your girlfriend’s favorite radio program play “your” song and then have the DJ ask her, on the air, if she will marry you. Make sure that you are aware of the exact time the DJ will be making the announcement so that you can make sure that you and your girlfriend are listening together. And send the DJ what you want him/her to say ahead of time so you can make sure your message is right.
Place an ad in a local newspaper or on a billboard asking her to marry you. If you choose the newspaper, make sure its in a section you know she loves to read everyday. Be there when she reads it! (It’s a good idea to have a talented friend help with design.)
Rent ad space for your proposal at a theater and invite her for a night out at the movies. Get there in plenty of time to buy popcorn before the ads begin. After your proposal has run, present her with a ring. Hooray for Hollywood!
Propose at a sporting event or concert. Arrange to have your proposal broadcast over the public address system or displayed on the large screen. You could also contact the team’s/performer’s public relations department and try to make arrangements to make your proposal on the field at halftime or during an intermission.
Invite your soon to be fiancé who is not afraid of heights on a hot air balloon ride and, as you take off, have the staff below unroll a banner with your proposal. Take along some refreshments and maybe a bottle of champagne; and don’t forget the engagement ring!
Work with a local community cable network to film a 30-second proposal that they’ll broadcast for a small donation on the leased access channel in your community. (Sometimes they charge only $100 or so and they’ll run your “television spot” multiple times for everyone to see again and again.) Find out what times they’ll run it and make sure you’re with her when she sees it.
Hire a local high school marching band to play “your” song in front of her house. When she opens the door, kneel down and present her with the ring.
Sources: Proposal List