Iowa farmer enlists a litter of piglets to propose to his girlfriend

— -- A pig pen doesn’t normally come to mind when thinking of romantic spots, but for one Iowa couple, it will always hold a special place in their hearts.

In February, farmer Benjamin Shivers tricked his girlfriend Emily Geisler-Lingren into his hog shed under the pretense of helping her niece with a school project.

As she looked over the pen, she saw something spelled out on the piglets’ backs in black marker. What it said though, she couldn’t quite make out.

“It took me a second to put together what was there,” Geisler-Lingren told ABC News of the moment she realized that written on the piglets back were the words, “Emily, will you marry me?”

In video recorded by her sister of the moment, Geisler-Lingren whips around and Shivers is down on one knee on the barn floor with a diamond ring in hand.

“I was kind of confused in the moment too because I wasn’t expecting that at all. Then when I put it together, I started to cry and then turned around and Ben was down on one knee,” she said.

“I was skeptical about doing it in a hog shed,” Shivers told The Des Moines Register. “I didn’t know what she would think about the atmosphere,” he added.

There was one thing about that atmosphere that she noticed. When she walked into the barn, Geisler-Lingren said she noticed Shivers had cleaned up, even putting fresh wood shavings down.

“Impressive -- for him,” she quipped.

But Geisler-Lingren said the setting was perfect for the couple, who both grew up on farms. They met seven years ago thru mutual friends, but the timing wasn’t quite right, Geisler-Lingren said.

The couple reconnected in 2016 at the Polk County Fair, a fitting spot for a couple who would later get engaged in a hog shed.

They’re beginning to plan their wedding now and are considering a September ceremony either at their farm or at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, which Geisler-Lingren said is a special spot to the couples and their families.