He may have only been on Married At First Sight for a short period of time, but Chris Jensen is now ready to stand at the altar once more – and this time it’s the real deal!
WATCH BELOW: MAFS’ “secret couple” Chris and Jaimie enter the experiment
To end the year off on a high, the former reality TV groom has proposed to his girlfriend Tayla Made on a luxury yacht at sunset in the Whitsundays, and it was every bit as romantic as you could imagine.
In an exclusive chat with New Idea, Chris dishes on all the details, from planning the proposal to future wedding plans, and how MAFS helped prepare him for this very milestone.
“This was the moment I’ve been waiting for,” he tells us. “This is what I was looking to find on Married At First Sight, but it’s just come about a different way.”
“I’m a big believer in seizing the moment and the opportunity, and if it’s right, it’s right.”
And seize the moment he did, with a stunning pear-shaped, 1.52-carat diamond ring from Novita Diamonds, that he picked out with the help of his two daughters.
“I took Tayla in with my daughters because they love to window shop and had a look to get an idea of what she liked on the sly,” he reveals.
The $14,500 ring, which is made of renewable diamonds, also holds a special meaning to Chris, who chose Novita Diamonds due to his work in the mining industry.
“These diamonds are renewable obviously because they’re man-made, and they don’t cost all the diesel. They don’t cost all the coal that takes to create the energy to mine them out.
“And I just think that the way that we are and the way that the Earth’s going, that everyone needs to start to push, to lean towards more of a renewable and more of an energy-saving, saving cost. So that was a big thing for me as far as going with a created diamond.”
After getting the ring and everything else in order, Chris popped the question to Tayla during a scenic photoshoot on the Wings Sailing yacht.
It adds a sentimental touch for the pair, who met in a similar fashion during a photoshoot in Sydney, where they hit it off immediately.
“I was very drawn to her,” Chris admits. “We were just friends at the start, and then I kind of realised that there was definitely something there.”
“We spent more time together and then she came up to the Sunshine Coast and spent some time with me and it just sort of felt right.”
The couple are currently living together on the Sunshine Coast, where Chris shares two daughters with an ex-partner.
It’s how well Tayla bonded with his girls that really stood out to Chris, making her “fit” almost seamlessly into his life.
“It’s a massive part of my life, my two daughters, and they absolutely adore her, and she adores them,” he gushes.
In fact, Chris admits it was their eagerness to have Tayla in their lives for “the rest of their days” that really motivated him to ask her to marry him.
“That was what made me definitely go, ‘Yeah. You know what, I’m just going to go ahead and do it’,” he says.
The next big milestone for the couple is to officially tie the knot, which Chris hopes to do in the stunning location of Santorini – vastly different to his on-screen nuptials.
“I’d be happy to just run away and do it with her in Santorini and just have an incredibly magical experience there together,” he says, before adding that they’re in “no rush” to do so just yet.
“A long engagement is something that’s fine,” he says, adding that the pair have both been married before. “There’s no rush to get that done.”
Naturally, the topic of kids also comes to mind, and Chris says he and Tayla have already spoken about the possibility of expanding their family.
“I actually have to have a reversal to have kids again,” he laughs. “But, when you’re with the right person, I don’t think any of that matters; that just sort of comes naturally.”
As for how his short but memorable stint on MAFS ties in with his real-life marital status, Chris says there’ll be one key difference.
“I won’t be as scared as when I was when I didn’t know who was walking down the aisle – that’s for sure,” he laughs.
On a serious note, he credits the show for teaching him “a lot of things” about himself, and also about what it’s like to be in the limelight.
“At the end of the day, nothing has changed in me as a person, it is who I am and what my core is and what I believe about that kind of a commitment.
“That’s always been me as a person and I think that I’m fully prepared for everything that I want in life and this is the first step towards getting that with Tayla.”
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