Photo Credit: Instagram
On June 7th, 2013, Amanda Roman experienced three milestones in just a few hours: Ryan Leak, her boyfriend of five years, said "I love you" for the first time; then, they got engaged in front of 100 loved ones, and later on, the couple tied the knot in a wedding filled with all of her favorite things.
Miraculously, she was unaware that any of these events were about to occur, thanks to Leak's dogged determination to surprise her. The plan was hatched two years prior, when the 27-year-old Dallas native overheard Roman, 25, telling a friend that her dream was to get engaged and married on the same day.
When it came time to propose to his future wife, he always knew he wanted to "do something extravagant" — but he never expected that would mean organizing an entire wedding from start to finish on his own. "I don't know any guy who wakes up and actually wants to plan a wedding," Leak says in a video about the couple's story, which has now gone viral.
After deciding that the joint engagement/wedding would take place during a trip to Miami on the couple's fifth anniversary, the groom-to-be only told a handful of people about his plans and swore them to secrecy. Using Roman's "Dream Wedding" Pinterest board as his guide — which contained over 200 photos featuring everything from bouquets to must-have shots — he organized the event in a year and a half. "It helped me out tremendously...she planned the entire wedding without even knowing she planned the entire wedding," he says.
From what we can tell, it looks like he nailed her vision!
The lovely bride:
Photo Credit: Instagram
The inspiration behind her wedding-day look:
Photo Credits: Amanda Roman's Pinterest account
The bride's beautiful engagement ring:
Photo Credit: Instagram
A pin that read: "Only 6 rules: 1) Ask for my parents blessing. 2) Make it a complete surprise. 3) Use my full name 4) Get down on one knee. 5.) Have somebody catch it on camera. 6) make sure my nails are done :)" He met all six criteria!
Photo Credit: Amanda Roman's Pinterest account
Despite a series of mishaps — including a canceled flight, a tropical storm and nosy passerby asking why the couple had a videographer following them around — he finally asked the big question; not "will you marry me?" but "will you marry me today?"
The bride-to-be was understandably shocked: "The day was even better than how I would have planned it,” she said. “Realistically I never thought that I would be able to pull off some of the things I saw on Pinterest, but Ryan is a risk-taker and he didn’t settle for my watered-down version of my ‘dream wedding’ — he went for the gusto.”
Although Roman didn't get to experience the wedding-planning process firsthand, that didn't matter to her: She just wanted to marry her best friend. "Whenever we thought about our day...the thing that was most important to us was that whoever was doing our wedding and whoever was at our wedding, that they were just [taking part] in something special, and that something special was the presence of God," says Leaks.
Congratulations to the happy couple! Skip to the 13:52 mark in the video below to watch the action unfold:
Tell us: If given the chance, would you want to have a surprise wedding like Roman did?
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