The answer to a puzzle is life-changing when the question is ‘will you marry me?’
A puzzles fan was shocked to discover a marriage proposal hidden in her favourite magazine.
Take a Break Arrowwords subscriber Laura Seal, 42, was solving the July issue unaware of the surprise that her partner Scott had arranged.
Scott Bond, 40, said, “Laura has bought Arrowwords religiously for as long as I’ve known her. I was looking at it one day and thought — I’ve no idea if this would work, but I wonder if I could get my proposal into one of the puzzles”.
The Portsmouth pair who recently celebrated three years together had joked about how Scott might pop the question when the time came.
“Laura said she’d be able to see when I was going to propose because I wouldn’t be able to hide my nerves. Well, that was it, challenge accepted”, said Scott.
A special puzzle
Scott enlisted the help of the Puzzle Magazines team to put the plan into action. Together they devised a puzzle which they hoped even super solver Laura might not spot the true solution to straight away.
“Laura looks at the puzzles in the evening before we go to bed, it’s our nightly routine. She rattles through them, and it was the same with the proposal arrowword”, said Scott.
“I didn’t say anything there and then. I left it another couple of days until she was solving again. Then I said to her — I thought you said you’d see it coming? It’s there in black-and-white — I proposed to you two days ago!”
The answers to the clues revealed: ‘Laura, marry me? Love Scott’.
Scott then produced a ring from his bedside table to seal the deal.
“She was blown away; she couldn’t believe I was able to get it in to her favourite magazine”.
NHS worker Laura admits that she didn’t rumble Scott, “I love the puzzles and I did wonder why he was so keen for me to solve this one, but I still wasn’t expecting it”, said Laura.
“I didn’t think he was being serious, but when I saw the ring I said ‘oh my days!’”.
Rebecca Dubock, Arrowwords editor, said, “When Scott approached us, I was thrilled to be able to help – what a romantic idea!
Wherever I could, I tried to theme the puzzle. Hopefully answers such as ‘Hen parties’ and clues like ‘Take on Me band’ (for A-HA) helped to set the scene.
Everyone was on tenterhooks waiting to hear how it went – Laura and Scott have had a crowd of puzzle editors cheering them on all the way”.
The couple, who both have children from previous relationships, are considering a small family wedding as part of a holiday to Greece next year.