Giraffe Halloween Costume

Halloween is not just a holiday for me—it’s a sport. And becoming the Michael Jordan of it is my life’s goal. Nothing is more fun for me than coming up with creative costume ideas and craftily executing them.

For my company’s Halloween party yesterday, I went as a giraffe. And not just a look-my-shirt-is-giraffe-print-and-i-have-a-horn-headband-on giraffe. I wanted to go big (literally) and recruited some contractor’s stilts and crutches to do so. Yes, I felt a little like a young Forest Gump-giraffe hybrid with the stilt leg braces, but ultimately, they were perfect.

In case you want to make your own giraffe costume, here’s how I did it:

I covered  both the stilts and crutches in giraffe-print felt using a hot glue gun, and cut slits in each wrapped crutch so that I could slip my arms into them. The height of the stilts and crutches lined up perfectly so that my body was at roughly the same pitch as a giraffe’s.

For the tail and ears, I bought a cat ear & tail set at iParty and covered them in the same giraffe-print felt. I found this awesome fur trim at A.C. Moore and added that to the ear insides and tail end.

To recreate a giraffe’s horns, I put my hair in pigtails, twisted a doubled-over pipe cleaner around each hair tie, and wrapped my hair around it, securing with a second hair tie.

Brown face paint was an easy choice for turning my face and neck into that of a giraffe’s, and some false eyelashes recreated the animal’s signature long lashes.

Originally, I wanted to make a full-on giraffe-print body suit by adding brown felt spots to a nude-colored jumpsuit, but there just weren’t enough hours in the day. I reach for the sky with these costume ideas, and then my full-time job, adult responsibilities and budget slowly bring me back down to earth.

I have two more costumes (one for this weekend in Boston and one for next week in Vegas), which I’ll share over the next week. Also, I promise that in November I’ll get back into the swing of posting one or two workouts a week. Pinkie promise. Cross my heart and hope to die stick a needle in my eye.

What are you guys being for Halloween??