How to Plan a Successful (Surprise) Proposal

So, you want to plan a surprise proposal but you aren't sure how to do it. OR your girlfriend or significant other is just too suspicious for you to be able to pull everything off successfully without them blowing the cover off the entire thing beforehand, right?

Well, those were the same thoughts running through my brain whenever I started planning to propose to my then girlfriend, Jaden. But, thankfully, I was able to think of a way for myself that I could execute my plan without any interruptions and today, I am going to give you a few tips and steps to help you successfully pull off the ultimate surprise proposal!

Step Number One: Plan Ahead

This step might seem like a no-brainer but trust me, you'll want to start planning way in advance. I took my fiancée ring shopping in March of 2017, which is when I got the ring, and I proposed in December of 2017. Plan. Ahead. Now, it was not my initial plan to wait almost 9 months to actually propose, that is just the way it worked out for me. And certainly you do not have to wait that long either. I am just using this as an example to show you that the more thought and time you give yourself to plan it, the more successful it will probably be.

My original plan was to propose in August of 2017 in the beautiful mountains of Colorado (we currently reside in Kansas) with just her, myself, and a secret photographer to capture the moment for us. But, after researching the cost of photographers and the cost of just getting out there, while being a college kid who had classes and football beginning in just a few weeks; neither my wallet or myself was very excited at that prospect or how realistic it was. So, I had to change plans last minute and think of a different way to pop the question!

Step Two: Research/Hire a Photographer to Capture the moment!

That leads me into my second point, the photographer! After my first plan was foiled due to cost and school, I came up with a plan B. After thinking of different ways I could do it in Kansas and researching different photographers, I finally settled on one of my best friends! Luckily for me him and his girlfriend were just starting out their photography business, and my girlfriend already knew them as well. So I asked them if they would be up for the challenge!

They gladly accepted and us 3 met up and started planning, shooting ideas over a coffee on how it would go down. I came up with the idea of my friends inviting me and my (at the time) girlfriend to come be models for them for a free "photo shoot" because they needed to get content for their new website/portfolio. Pretty clever, right?

Step Three: Pick a location and plan with your photographer!

After going with the "photo shoot" idea my friend and I started to narrow down locations around Wichita, which is where we both live. Since I decided on an early December shoot we knew the leaves would be off the trees and it could be very cold out. We finally decided on Chisolm Creek Park in Wichita, KS. It has many different walking trails with different trees/forest areas and one little hill that you can walk up and see the sunset, and I wanted sunset photos of the moment. So we all agreed that location would be perfect!

The plan was for us to all meet there on a Sunday afternoon, and walk around the park to different locations and get photos for awhile to play up the "photo shoot" element, because I mean it was a photo shoot!

After snapping a lot of photos in different spots, the sun started to set and I knew time was running short if we wanted to capture that perfect sunset photo!

All 4 of us started heading towards the little hill in the park, trying to get set up before the sun set.

My friend positioned my girlfriend in front of me, while I stood behind so she could get "different angles", also so I could get the ring out of my pocket and get in my spot for the big question!