A couple came up with an ingenious way to surprise their friends and family with their pregnancy news – by altering their restaurant menus to include baby-based clues.
Nicole Runyan, from San Diego, California, discovered she was pregnant ahead of her husband Jay’s birthday in August, providing him with the perfect present by announcing the new arrival on Jay’s big day itself.
After that initial excitement had worn off, Jay, 41, and Nicole, 32, started working on ideas for how best to surprise their friends and family.
Rather than copy previous trends from social media, Jay and Nicole wanted to come up with something totally original – which led Jay to think of modifying menus at a restaurant.
Jay’s initial idea involved putting Nicole’s ultrasound picture on the menus themselves – but Nicole decided to take things one step further.
Having looked for the different menu designs of the locations where she and Jay would break the big news, Nicole then started altering the names of dishes with baby or pregnancy slogans.
Included on the menus were the likes of “New tax deduction coming soon” and “Silent nights ending next year,” while all of the prices – $4.20 – were a hint to Nicole’s due date of April 20, 2024.
Then, across two separate meals, the couple decided to capture the reactions of their good friends, Max and Christina, as well as Nicole’s mom Karen and sister Kristin.
In both of the hilarious videos that Nicole was able to capture of the moments, the two pairs looked completely stunned as they tried to make sense of what had happened to the usual menu items.
When things finally clicked, Christina’s jaw dropped, while Nicole’s mom required the help from her stunned daughter, having, at one point, wanted to hand the confusing menu back.
Nicole later shared the two clips on TikTok, where viewers praised not only the amazing reactions of those being surprised, but also Nicole and Jay for the originality of their idea.
Nicole said: “After we were all seated the immediate reactions were ones of pure confusion.
“They were reading all the fake food slogans out loud because it didn’t make sense, expressing several times that they didn’t know why all the prices were the same, $4.20.
“After waiting several minutes it clicked for some of them.
“Christina finally got it!
“Max just had the look on his face of, Wow you just played a joke on us, but once Christina said, ‘You guys are pregant,’ his jaw really dropped – literally, you can see it in the video.
“Same for my sister, Kristin.
“She was the one to guess it first, and she ended up being really shocked, and then it turned to happy tears.
“Jay and I were literally cracking up and couldn’t stop laughing.
“It was the talk of the dinner table for quite some time.
“Everyone’s reaction – and confusion – was amazing to witness, and it was better than what we could have ever expected.”