My Proposal Story…

Coming to the end of the year, you tend to reflect on all of the things that have happened and what you’ve achieved throughout the past twelve months. I won’t lie, I didn’t think i’d achieved much, and then I realised – one of the biggest things happened this year… I GOT ENGAGED.

Although my year hasn’t been the easiest, this day was BY FAR my favourite of the year and coming to the end of 2017, I thought it would be the perfect time to share this special day with you. The day Nadeem proposed to me.

So first things first. We knew we were going to get married. In Pakistani culture, the parents meet first to seal the deal and then you can make it official. So we knew we were going to get married (iA) once they had met but he’d not proposed yet, so this bit was a surprise.

The build up…

A couple of weeks before he proposed we were on the phone and Nadeem suggested we go to Knaresborough. I was on to him straight away. If you’re a girl, you’ll know, we always make the plans and boys just follow. So when Nad suggested to plan a date day I thought hmmm… a bit strange but okay (FYI I love Knaresborough).

Then came the second bit of strange behaviour… Knaresborough is in between mine and Nads house so we decided that we would just meet there. Around a week before we met for lunch and he said “Tayybs, how about you get a train to Knaresborough, we can go for dinner and I will take you home after?” I was like “What? That doesn’t make sense.. where are we going for dinner?” and he was like “it’s a surprise.” Again, completely on to him now. But I just got really excited and assumed he was taking me to Tattu in Manchester because I’d been saying I wanted to go for a while (and geographically this made sense to take me home after). I asked if we were going to Tattu and we were both just sniggering for AGES – I was like why you laughing? And he was like i’m not, why are you laughing? (Lol, you know when you both know somethings fishy).

The night before he told me to wear something nice for the meal and dress up a little… THIS WAS THE WEIRDEST ONE. Nadeem likes me best when I’m simple so for him to tell me to wear make up and dress up was very very strange and I was almost 100% sure it was going to happen but I thought narrr I know he doesn’t have the ring yet as he was getting it from Dubai. But nonetheless, I told all my friends and (secretly) got all giddy and excited.

On the day…

Oh I was stressing so much – I thought I didn’t look pretty enough to be getting proposed to but then as always I was running late so I was like who cares just get out of the house because YOU’VE GOT A TRAIN TO CATCH. I hadn’t had enough time to buy anything new and I was gutted.

When I got into Nadeems car he was SOOO CASUAL. Like literally 10/10 for acting on this day Nad. We walked around Knaresborough, ate a fish butty, talked about life and we took some snaps – not worrying much about time or anything. He occasionally looked at his watch but I was like oh… maybe I was wrong. I tried to look out for a little box somewhere but saw nothing.

Then after Knaresborough he told me I needed to go get changed because I was in my dungarees (lol) and he said he was taking me to my “surprise” before dinner. He wouldn’t tell me the location or anything. Being the detective I am, I looked out for any clues and I realised – we were on our way to Stockheld Park.

Stockheld Park is one of the most magical places at Christmas time and one of the first places me and Nadeem went together. It holds such special memories and I am so so happy he picked this spot.

When we pulled up to Stockheld Park there was a big banner for a wedding fair and he was like “surprise, we’re going to a wedding fair!” I was like oh… interesting. This was the surprise. Literally guys I was like what an anticlimax. I was sure he was not proposing anymore and the surprise was us going to a wedding fair (Remember we knew were getting married aha). I felt so deflated and overdressed. Lol poor me.

We walked around the wedding fair and I felt annoyed for getting myself so excited but also thought, aww bless the cutie for bringing me here. We saw some beautiful ideas for our wedding (iA) like this gorgeous flower wall and beaut table decor.

In the maze…

After the wedding fair we were leaving the park and Nadeem asked a man working if we could go into the maze. The man told us the park was closing in 10 minutes but Nadeem was like “Please, we’ll be quick..” – I thought to myself, strange behaviour Nadeem, as he’s not one for confrontation – THE BOYS ACTING THIS DAY THOUGH.

As we walked around the maze, I started to hear “our song” – Daylight by Maroon 5 really loud throughout the park. I was so excited and singing along at the top of my voice… Totally oblivious to the fact this was not a coincidence haha.

It was unintentional and not a part of Nadeems plan but we ended up getting lost in the maze and could not find our way out. I was whinging and cold and telling him this was such a stupid idea and that the park was going to close and we were going to get locked in Stockheld Park forever. Again, he kept his cool.

Then something weird happened – something I didn’t want Nad to find out. I kept wanting to go up onto the bridges to look out onto the maze so that we could find our way to the exit but Nadeem kept stopping me and then one time when I quickly ran on to one before he could stop me – I saw a man in the distance with a big video camera running behind a building. I was like THAT IS SO WEIRD. DO I TELL HIM? DO I NOT? WHO WAS THAT? ARE WE BEING STALKED? ARE WE ON A TV SHOW? WHAT THE HELL. I kept it to myself in case it was a part of his plan and I didn’t want to ruin it.
Bearing in mind, all through this time, DAYLIGHT is still playing non stop in the background and I was like NADEEM THIS IS WEIRD, ‘OUR SONG’ WON’T STOP PLAYING, WE CAN’T GET OUT OF THE MAZE, (THERE ARE WEIRD STALKER MEN VIDEOING US) – He was like “Oh the song? Their record player must be jammed” HAHAHA THAT GUY.

The proposal…

A good 45 minutes later we finally got to the end of the maze… Now I could hear the music louder and more clear and when we FINALLY exited the maze… There was a whole entourage of people there! A photographer, videographer, staff, vendors, randomers applauding us. There were petals on the floor, a stunning flower wall and again, our song was still blaring throughout the park.
I was so shocked! I was laughing like a lunatic and kept saying OH MY GOD in this really high pitched annoying voice. Looking back at the video is so bloody embarrassing. Nadeem was trying to compose me for a while going “tayyeba, tayyeba, tayyeba, tayyeba here…here… here” – hahaha because I was so overwhelmed with everything and he just wanted to actually propose at that point.
He got down on one knee and was smiling uncontrollably, said a few sweet things and asked. I WAS LIKE WELL DURRRRR. Then everyone starting cheering and applauding us!

I turned around and there was my sister and brother in law to be beaming! I know it sounds silly but I will always say I have never seen such genuine happiness on a bunch of peoples faces haha. They were literally grinning from ear to ear and I went and gave them a big hug. Sabirah was in tears bless her and Khalid was like well done bro and Nad was like thanks bro haha (typical boys ey?).

The vendors then came to see me and told me Nad had it all planned for months and had sent them sketches of how he wanted it all to look and they’d been working together to make it happen. It turns out he got the ring delivered to my sister whilst she was in Abu Dhabi the little sneaky one!!

Afterwards…

As soon as we got over all the squeals and excitement Nadeem was like right, we need to go or we’ll miss our booking. I was like where we going? And the fricking cutie was like TATTU OBVIOUSLY. HAHAHA DAY BLOODY MADE. ALHAMDULILAH WHAT A FLIPPING GUY. He proposed and finally took me to Tattu all in a days work haha.

There we were joined by my siblings which made me sooooo happy! We ate and talked endlessly about the proposal and how we’d gotten stuck for 45 minutes and everyone was waiting outside for us and honestly, it was one of those moments i’ll cherish forever. I didn’t like the food and it cost a bloody fortune!! But I think it’s because we had to have this set menu. The service wasn’t great either but who cares I WAS FLIPPING ENGAGED.
We then went home and I took like 45 selfies with my ring and tried to keep it quiet till we asked dad if we could finally announce it to the world. Haha, then came our Instagram/Facebook posts and everyone was buzzzzing!

I still haven’t gotten a perfect picture of my ring (because my hands aren’t very pretty) but it’s so sparkly and beautiful mashallah! Exactly what I wanted! I still just stare at it sometimes and think I LOVE IT.

Hahaha… So there you have it guys, my proposal story. Ahhh thinking back to it all has made me so happy. Alhamdulilah for an amazing partner and amazing family who managed to keep it all a secret till the big day!

Thank you for reading and joining us in our happiness. I cannot wait to start wedding blogging in the new year, LOTS of exciting planning content to come guys!

I hope you have all had an amazing 2017 and lets all pray for an even better 2018!

Lots of love <3

Tayybs xxx

Photography: Becki Mcphillips – All you Need is Love Photography
Videography: 2 Little Ducks
Floral backdrop: Twisted Willow Floristry