Joshua Renaud and Brittany Hunter after getting engaged on Nov. 11.Photo:Joshua Renaud
Joshua Renaud
When Josh Renaud was just four years old the man he calls “dad” proposed to his mother. While his mom was given a ring during the proposal, he says his dad also gifted him a small gold band with the promise to be there for him and his mom forever.
“Since that moment, I always knew that if I were to ever be blessed with the opportunity to propose to a woman who was also a mother, I would do it the same way my dad did,” Renaud, 38, tells PEOPLE.
So when Brittany Hunter, 34, and her four children came into Renaud’s life he knew right away that if he proposed in the future, he would also ask her children to marry him, just like his dad years ago. On Nov. 11, Renaud did just what he’d always planned. He got down on one knee and asked Hunter to marry him with a ring for his future wife and each of her her four children.
On Nov. 11 Joshua Renaud posed to his girlfriend Brittany Hunter and also her 4 kids.Joshua Renaud
In aTikTok videoof the special moment, Renaud stands beside Hunter’s four kids wearing shirts that read “Can we call Josh dad?” When Hunter walks into the room and sees what’s happening she immediately starts to tear up.
“Brittany, you have shown me a kind of love that I never knew I was capable of feeling, and I would be honored to be your husband and these kids’ dad,” Renaud says to Hunter later in the video.
After popping the question, Renaud gets back on one knee and asks the same question to each of her kids. As he does this he opens up a box and also hands each of them a ring. “The pure love and excitement in their eyes hit me like a freight train,” he says.
Joshua Renaud and Brittany Hunter celebrate their engagement.Joshua Renaud
“I was in complete shock!” Hunter adds. “We had been discussing marriage but I didn’t have any idea when he would actually propose. As soon as I turned around I knew what was happening. I quickly read the shirts and questioned if my legs would carry me across the room because I could no longer feel them.”
“I knew that I was walking across the room to the man who would become not only my husband but also dad to my four precious children,” she continues. “Seeing the love in their eyes and the pure excitement on their faces, I very quickly became overwhelmed with emotion.”
She adds: “I was trying desperately to avoid sobbing as the tears were forming because I did not want to miss a single word. The children and I experienced tremendous loss after the sudden and unexpected passing of their daddy, my husband, three years ago. I never thought that it would be possible to find someone who would love us all the way that he did. Then, Josh came into our lives and has shown us that kind of love and happiness again.”
Renaud recalls that when he first told Hunter’s kids that he was going to propose they were ecstatic. “The kids were more excited than I ever could have imagined,” Renaud says. “The way their smiles radiated, and the amount of love I saw in their eyes was something that I was not expecting.”
Only a few months into the couple’s relationship, he says that her kids were already asking him if he was going to be their dad.
The couple explained they told the kids it would “take some more time for them to figure that out.” However, they add, it didn’t stop them from continuing to ask.
“I can’t remember specifically when the idea to have the kids wear the shirts for the proposal popped into my head, but it was somewhere around that time.”
Brittany Hunter and her 4 kids all wearing their rings from Joshua Renaud.Joshua Renaud
Renaud also says that when since he outgrew the gold band that his dad proposed to him with, his mom started wearing it on her hand next to her own wedding ring.
Moments after he proposed to Hunter, his mom took the gold band off of her finger – that had been there for 30+ years – and offered it to Hunter as her wedding band.
“It was one of the most beautiful moments of my life,” Renaud says.
source: people.com
