When Ray Smith decided it was time to propose to his girlfriend Claire Bramley, he wanted a few practice runs before getting down on one knee.

So rather than turn to family or friends for advice, he decided to propose 148 different times – in secret.

Yep, over the course of five months, Ray snuck a card bearing the words 'Will You Marry Me?' into 148 different photos of himself and Claire, who was pregnant with their baby at the time.

"I have been planning to propose for a while and I knew I wanted to do something romantic," he explains.

"I told her I was taking the pictures to track the progress of the baby. Sometimes she wanted to see the pictures so I had to take more than one – one with the card and one without."

Ray admits the process didn't always go to plan, however.

"It was really stressful putting it all together, it took a lot of hard work. She nearly caught me a couple of times but I just had to pray it worked."

Luckily for Ray, Claire says she was "oblivious" to his master plan, and when the time finally did come to pop the question for real, she was blown away.

Watch Ray's proposal video, featuring the photos, below:

Very cute.