Romantic Texts Messages: The height of romance!

The height of romance!
LOVE really was in the air when a romantic Broughton Astley man hired a plane to fly a 120ft marriage proposal banner over the village.Paul Birch (41) paid £130 for a specialist company to tow a banner reading 'Paula, will you marry me, love Paul' for his girlfriend Paula Butlin (41) and the whole village to see.

The light aircraft was booked to fly the banner, featuring 5ft letters and a love heart 1,000 foot over the village at 5.30pm.After suggesting a carefully co-ordinated cup of tea in the garden Mr Birch pointed out the plane, which his partner clocked as he got down on one knee.

Speaking minutes after the proposal, Mrs Butlin said: "My eyesight is a bit bad. He's going, 'look at that plane, what does that say?' Somebody loves Paula. I was gobsmacked. I said 'Yes! Tomorrow!'"

The couple were greeted by family, friends and neighbours– who were all in on the secret and waiting in Jubilee Close outside their home.Mrs Butlin, who works in accounts for Blaby District Council, added: "I just can't believe it. I'm so happy and now everyone else will be happy for us too."I didn't have a clue, he's done really well to keep it a secret!"

Mr Birch said it was very difficult to act normally during the time between picking her up from work at about 4pm and the special moment.He said: "It's been hard because she has been coming home wanting to go shopping, wanting to carry on with chores. I didn't want to make it too obvious. I made a cup of tea and said 'come on, lets sit in the chairs outside'.

Accounts manager Mr Birch, met his fiancee-to-be in 2000 when they worked together at JCB in Whetstone and hit it off straight away.He said: "My boss nearly gave it away. He phoned me this morning singing, 'I'm getting married in the morning' – it was a nightmare, I was trying to keep it a secret, but other people knew about it."

Mr Birch booked the plane last month with Husbands Bosworth based company Towplanes.com.He said he was not normally prone to grand romantic gestures, but, having been married before, he wanted to do things differently.

He has an 18-year-old son Stuart from a previous relationship and Paula, who has also been married before, has two sons, Lewis (12) and Marcus(8).

Towplanes.com owner and airline pilot Roger Goodman said it was the first marriage proposal he had flown since the company was founded several months ago.

He said: "We have done our research and know what kind of requests to expect, but I was nervous for him."I said to my ground crew, I'm nervous about this one and it's not the flying."

Mr Goodman will also be towing a Radio Lutterworth banner over Lutterworth during the Feast Week carnival on the Coventry Road recreation ground this Saturday.

The plane is flown by himself or a hired pilot and normally costs £330 per hour but Mr Birch only needed about 20 minutes to get the message across.14 August 2006