Proposing

[Emma Raducanu]

Is there a right or wrong time to propose? That is to say, should your life circumstances resemble a projection of how you might exist together post-marriage?

Currently, I'm in minimum wage work, looking to get something better and have no money; she is unemployed and applying for various work. Due to geography I haven't yet introduced my girlfriend to my parents though I have spent a lot of time with hers. We rent somewhere quite crap and are both not sure whether we'll be moving to a new part of the country.

We've also only been 'going out' for 18 months but have basically lived together for all that time.

It isn't necessary to propose; things are fine. But for a few months I've developed a strong impulse to propose - possibly around Christmas time. In my tiny little head, I'd love for us to agree to spend the rest of our lives together at this time of year.

As mentioned, I have no money and I hear it is standard for a man to spend 2 months salary on an engagement ring, which would basically be a Hula Hoop. Would I regret getting what would be a shit ring when later in life I could afford something better.

There's just a lot of questions and I'm interested in people's own experience of proposing or of being proposed to. Did cicrumstances beyond LOVE factor in at all.

Sorry to bring you this kind of nonsense

[mook]

be fine, go for it.

[babyshambler]

I hear it is standard for a man to spend 2 months salary on an engagement ring, which would basically be a Hula Hoop.

lol.

Nowt to suggest though, sorry.

[Jemble Fred]

I hear it is standard for a man to spend 2 months salary on an engagement ring

No, that's only when the couple don't actually love each other.

[Queneau]

As mentioned, I have no money and I hear it is standard for a man to spend 2 months salary on an engagement ring, which would basically be a Hula Hoop. Would I regret getting what would be a shit ring when later in life I could afford something better.

I heard three months. So maybe one of those Haribo Jellies? Anyway, if she's as great as she obviously must be to have you even contemplating this, I'm sure it wont bother her at all. If it bothers you, it's a different matter. However, if it does happen just make sure that by the time you can afford the wedding etc. you buy her a big fuck off one that costs more than the house you move into.

[Ronnie the Raincoat]

We are both skint, and he proposed to me on Boxing Day last year.  He took me to the riverside in Belfast, wearing a nice suit, very nervous, having written down something to say, then did the whole, "Getting down on one knee" thing and I said yes, obviously.  On the way back someone shouted, "Let me see the ring!" which, because we were alone, made me think I was about to be mugged.  But it was the river staff watching us on CCTV.  Wish I could have the video.

The first thing he got wasn't very good, which he also thought so asked me if I wanted to get a new ring, which we did, together. (I felt like a total twat about it but it was obvious I didn't like it very much, even though I tried to hide it).   It wasn't expensive (less than £200), it was just more to my taste.  So the first ring is his engagement ring now. All those conventions are bullshit.

Nothing (consciously) beyond love factored into it.  We don't particularly even believe in marriage, but we want to be together for the rest of our lives, be a family, and this makes it official, really.  We're getting married next week.

[castro diaz]

A relation of mine told me how he proposed once.  She was pregnant, 18 and the timing just felt right apparently, especially considering it was happy hour at his dad's pub in the Welsh valleys.[nb]True.[/nb]  She knew something was up when he not only said she could order food, but was also allowed a side order of garlic bread.  Suspicions were raised during the intimate early bird menu option, so it was no surprise when he got out the ring and asked the Big Q.  She accepted immediately, and must have felt 3, maybe 4 seconds of joy holding the ring for the first time, right up until the point where he said 'And if we break up I'm fucking having that back.'

He did get it back an' all.

[thenoise]

How sweet.  If you're anything like I was a few years ago, you'll obsess about it for months and go around shop after shop getting the perfect ring within budget.  But she'll love it, you chose it and she'll be proud to wear it no matter how big or small it is.

I went for a low key proposal a few years ago, got her to close her eyes like I was going to give her a kinder egg or something, then I put the ring into her hand.  She loved it of course, and put it on but had to take it off again as her finger begun to turn blue.  Yeah, try and find out her finger size beforehand if you can do so subtly enough.

We broke up six months later, and she never gave back the ring.  But I'm sure you'll be fine :-)

[Beagle 2]

I log into Facebook, it's weddings. I log into twitter, its weddings. Talk to my friends, weddings. My weekends, weddings. My bank holidays, weddings. My annual leave, oh yeah it's weddings. Log in here, fuck me if it isn't weddings. Constant weddings. Breathing down my neck. Nuzzling my crotch. Whispering in my ear: "Do it. Try it. Are you not a man? Get married. Marry. Get married. Have a wedding. EVERYONE HAS A WEDDING. EVERYONE GETS MARRIED. AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA YOU KNOW YOU CAN'T ESCAPE IT'S ONLY 200 POUNDS FOR A RING EVERYONE'S GOT THAT GET MARRIED GET MARRIED NOW DO IT DO IT GET MARRIED I ORDER YOU LOOK HOW FFFFFFUCKING HAPPY EVERYONE LOOKS".

I'm unmarried just at the moment and there's no pressure at all so that's nice *twitch*

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

If you're friends or with anyone who likes Don't Tell The Bride and happen to eat dinner when that show is on then you end up talking about weddings on a frankly unhealthy frequency.

I solved what was becoming a rather acute issue by slaughtering all of my friends and loved ones.

[Dead kate moss]

I was naked and spraying my sweaty balls with one of those water diffusers when I proposed. It worked, so do that.

[Johnny Townmouse]

If your partner wants a massively expensive piece of diamond encrusted jewllery to symbolise your imminent betrothment then she is a cunt and isn't worth marrying.

Does she normally wear ugly expensive jewelry? Does it seem like that would be appropriate? My wife likes old stuff that isn't garish, particularly antiques that are pretty rather than valuable. I picked her up a lovely antique ring for £150 in a second-hand place in Leeds (paid it off in three installments over three months) and proposed to her in the rectory in Fountains Abbey in Ripon. Because the notion of the man buying the woman jewellery is rather old-fashioned because of all that feminism and stuff, she also bought me an engagement ring - a copy of a medaeval posey ring. Probably cost the same as the ring I got her. She put it on my finger the night that I proposed to her.

It doesn't have to be a financial burden.

[Queneau]

It doesn't have to be a financial burden.

That's what the marriage itself is for. Right, folks?

[shiftwork2]

I hear it is standard for a man to spend 2 months salary on an engagement ring

+1 to this being balls.  De Beers marketing, that's all:

http://youtu.be/8pU6WQXkiOU

Not sure why they didn't 'suggest' 25 years salary.  After all, if she means the world to you...

[Emma Raducanu]

No, she would make no financial demands regarding the ring. I think she'd be happy with something she liked which could cost as little as £10. The hard part for me would be finding something she really liked - where are good places to look? Just jewlers or is there somewhere good for browsing on the internet? I have never bought a piece of jewelry in my life.

[Smeraldina Rima]

I once went out with a girl who described her pretty sausage like fingers as "sausage fingers". If it had lasted till Christmas I would have started shopping for a bacon rasher.

[Queneau]

No, she would make no financial demands regarding the ring. I think she'd be happy with something she liked which could cost as little as £10. The hard part for me would be finding something she really liked - where are good places to look? Just jewlers or is there somewhere good for browsing on the internet? I have never bought a piece of jewelry in my life.

Maybe http://www.hsamuel.co.uk/ as it's not overly expensive. Perhaps by a ring containing her birthstone. If she's into that kind of thing. Some are.

[castro diaz]

No, she would make no financial demands regarding the ring. I think she'd be happy with something she liked which could cost as little as £10. The hard part for me would be finding something she really liked - where are good places to look? Just jewlers or is there somewhere good for browsing on the internet? I have never bought a piece of jewelry in my life.

Go the Argos way and Elizibeth Duke it.  You could steal her one of those little blue pens while you're over by the catalogues so she can pretend she works in a William Hill.  That or suggest getting the rings tattooed on to her fingers with a fork and a lighter, like they do in chokey.

P.S.  Well done for finding a sensible one.

[Ronnie the Raincoat]

Maybe http://www.hsamuel.co.uk/ as it's not overly expensive. Perhaps by a ring containing her birthstone. If she's into that kind of thing. Some are.

There's where we got mine!  And it has my birthstone as well (sapphire, but a pink one).

[Queneau]

There's where we got mine!  And it has my birthstone as well (sapphire, but a pink one).

I'd been eyeing one up myself for my girlfriend. Also, sapphire. That was before we broke up, obviously. So, are you getting married around your birthday? Although, I'm sure you said next week.

[castro diaz]

One of my girlfriend's mates proposed by putting the ring inside a Pukka Pie.  Chicken and Mushroom[nb]Chicken and MushGroom, more like![/nb], I think.  He hid it inside and hoped she wouldn't choke.  They read The Guardian so I daresay it was more of an ironic jape than a depressing glimpse of their future expectations.

[Lee Van Cleef]

Best time is probably after you've been accused of rape and are hiding in the Ecuadorian embassy.

[ziggy starbucks]

As mentioned, I have no money and I hear it is standard for a man to spend 2 months salary on an engagement ring, which would basically be a Hula Hoop. Would I regret getting what would be a shit ring when later in life I could afford something better.

Find it. Get it. Argos it

[Ginyard]

Best time is probably after you've been accused of rape and are hiding in the Ecuadorian embassy.

I wonder if that counts as a diplomatic engagement.


When I proposed, I parachuted into a castle ballroom, slid across the floor like Fred Astaire, gracefully gliding on to one knee as a coda, and made my request.

Spoiler alert

Hangover in tow, I crawled out of bed in a moth-eaten pink dressing gown several sizes too small, collapsed on to both knees and, serenaded by the end credits to a repeat of Remington Steele, proposed. When the time is right, its right.

[close]

[mook]

^ that's the attitude. sod buying tacky geegaws, just give her the best fuck you have in you and mean it. women, although in most part are dreadful creatures, they know what they like and it ain't crap jewellery.

[ziggy starbucks]

may I recommend the Platinum Couture jewellery collection from Argos, and with prices from £24.99 to £64.99 the Platinum Couture range suits all budgets from small to large

Find it. Get it. Argos it

[Johnny Townmouse]

She would if she loves you.

[Sam]

I took her to the place of our first date, a magnificent church in the Norfolk broads. A daunting climb up the spire leads out onto a platform with a view across a huge section of Norfolk, rather stunning on a pleasant day.

I'm not religious at all but harbour a great love of churches, the grandiosity and the sublime architecture. I rub shoulders with  God botherers, little do they know my humanist leanings as I nod and chatter about the particulars of the interior, in a De Certeau-esque ruse.

Thus I rationalised to myself using a church for the purposes of engagement.

So my advice is use a rural idyll and/or pleasing architectural space to give your moment instant depth and pathos. Sorted.

[Blue Jam]

A friend of mine took his girlfriend on a weekend break to Rome where he proposed to her at the Colosseum, with a nice Art Deco ring he got second-hand from a small independent jewellers. I imagine it was sold as "vintage" and was probably more expensive for it, but maybe try smaller jewellers, or maybe even pawn shops. It looks like Crack Converters and the like have been buying lots of gold lately.

On second thoughts, looking at this is a tad depressing.

[The Boston Crab]

This week I proposed at the top of the Spanish Steps.

I was a bit nervous but Jesus Christ spoke to me in the Raphael Rooms and said there's nothing to worry about.