How to Make a Flamingo Costume

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

pink long sleeve t-shirt
black pants
pink ball cap
pink felt (enough to make 2 large wings)
black felt
white felt
orange felt (enough to overhang lip of ball cap)
multi-color glitter fabric paint
fabric glue
measuring tape
willing participant
non-sew velcro (optional)

Step 1

Lay out all your supplies on a sturdy work table. Lay out your pink felt and cut the wings. To measure wing height and length, take your willing participant and measure length of arm from elbow (bent) to fingertips. The wing should cover the entire length of arm and cover from tip of shoulder to just below elbow. The wing should also be a little bit longer than fingertips.
Step 2

Using the pink ball cap as a guide, cut out two triangles of orange felt to cover the lip of the ball cap. The triangles should meet a little past the lip at the tips of the triangles. Add creases to the middle of the triangles to make your beak. Set aside, using the pink ball cap as a guide again, cut out two white felt circles for the eyes of your willing participant flamingo, cut out two smaller black circles for the pupils, and set aside.
Step 3

Using spray starch, lightly spray the tips of the triangles and crease of the beak, set aside to dry. Now use the same spray starch and lightly spray the wings, use as needed on the outline of the wings, but spray lightly on the body of the wings.
Step 4

used this beak as a guide

After starch has dried, use multi-color glitter fabric paint and paint outline on wings. Also paint the wing shape, remember nothing in nature is perfect, so your wings are your own creation. Paint the outline of the beak as well, and paint the ends of the beak at the tips to resemble the beak of a flamingo. You can also paint the black felt pupils of the eyes for extra glitter, I made crazy eyes but whatever you want works too! Allow the paint to dry for at least 12 hours or overnight. Make sure paint has dried before continuing with next step. If it is not, allow to dry for an extra 8 hours before going to step 5.
Step 5

Glue the black felt circles to the white felt circles to make the eyes, let dry. Apply glue to the edge of fabric triangle, attach triangle to fabric of pink hat just above the lip of hat, repeat for bottom triangle, make sure paint is visible on outside of beak triangles. The small tip should overhang the edge of lip on your pink hat. Once eyes have dried, apply to fabric above the lip just above beak, placement is completely up to you, I made "crazy" eyes but it really is up to you or the willing participant. Set your completed hat to the side to allow glue to dry overnight.
Step 6

Now for your wings. On your sturdy clean work surface, lay the wings RIGHT SIDE DOWN. This means the side you want to show off needs to be laid down. You will need to gather up your extra felt to cut off FOUR WIDE strips of felt. To measure, round up your willing participant and measure his/her arm just below the elbow on their forearm. Measure the width around their arm and leave 1/2 inch for easy movement. Measure for the second strap just above the wrist on their forearm, again allow 1/2 inch for easy movement. You will also need to allow another 1 inch for each strip to glue/pin onto the wing. I don't recommend placing the strip on the wrist as this will restrict movement. Measure both arms this way and cut TWO WIDE strips of felt per arm. The wide strips should be at the very least 3 inches wide, but depending on the willing participant you can go as far as 4 1/2 to 5 inches. LIGHTLY spray the strips with fabric starch. Allow the strips to dry before going to next step.
Step 7

Once strips have completely dried, apply to the wrong side of wing. The easiest way to do accomplish this is to bring the wing up to the willing participant and mark on the inside of wing (wing side that isn't painted) where you measured for the felt strips. The best placement is off-center closer to the top of the wing for support. You don't want to place the strips in the exact center, gravity usually takes its toll before the day is over and the same reason applies if you place the strips too close to the bottom of the wing. Use the fabric glue to glue the strips onto the wing where you have marked placement. With the extra inch on each strip allow 1/2 inch from top and bottom to be glued onto the wing, you can also safety pin the strips using the extra allowed fabric for support. Repeat these steps on the second wing. Allow the glue to dry 12 hours or overnight.
Step 8

Now your willing participant is ready for their costume. Put on black pants and pink long sleeve t-shirt, black socks and black shoes complete this look. Carefully apply the pink hat to participant's head, and pull wings on one at a time. Now your costume is complete!