Couple who dressed up as Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce years before famous pair met react to engagement

By Yi-Jin Yu

An Oklahoma woman who dressed up as Taylor Swift alongside her husband, who dressed up as Travis Kelce for Halloween back in 2020, is sharing her reaction after the celebrity couple announced their engagement.

"I would have never in my life, in a million years, thought that they would even cross paths, much less be engaged," Makayla Stephens, 27, told ABC News.

Swift and Kelce shared photos of their engagement in an Instagram post Tuesday, featuring snapshots of Kelce proposing on one knee, the two of them surrounded by floral arrangements in a garden, and even a photo of Swift's ring, which ABC News confirmed is an old-mine brilliant cut diamond designed by Kelce and Kindred Lubeck of Artifex Fine Jewelry in New York City.

Stephens, a fifth-grade teacher, shared an Instagram photo post of her and her husband, Nick Stephens, also 27, back in October 2020, when the two were dressed up as the "Love Story" singer and the Kansas City Chiefs tight end for a Halloween family dinner -- before the real-life celebrity couple even met in 2023.

Courtesy Makayla Stephens

Makayla Stephens and Nick Stephens dressed up as celebrity couple Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce for Halloween in 2020.

Stephens wrote in her caption at the time, "I don't know any world in which Taylor Swift + Travis Kelce would be in the same room together, but apparently in this one they're married? #HappyHalloween."

"It's so ironic because everyone's like, 'Oh, you manifested it. You saw the future.' I'm like, if you guys only knew how little I had thought about these costumes in the moment, you guys would be shocked," Stephens said. "We threw them together. We were just trying to be the only ones at the party that weren't dressed up. So I think it's funny and it's coincidental."

Patrick Smith/Getty Images, FILE

In this Jan. 28, 2024, file photo, Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs celebrates with Taylor Swift after defeating the Baltimore Ravens in the AFC Championship Game at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, Maryland.

Stephens, who has been married to Nick Stephens since June 2020, said she has been a Swiftie since she was a child and her husband is a "huge Chiefs fan" and they even dressed up again as Swift and Kelce last Halloween.

Courtesy Makayla Stephens

Makayla Stephens and Nick Stephens, pictured with their daughters, dressed up for Halloween as Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce again in 2024.

Courtesy Makayla Stephens

Makayla Stephens and Nick Stephens dressed up as Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce again for Halloween in 2024.

"We were more intentional that time about what we were wearing and how we looked," Stephens recalled. "And then my oldest daughter was a cat because Taylor Swift and cats are besties. And then, I had just had my [younger] daughter in September and so she was a little football."

Now that Swfit and Kelce are entering their engaged era, Stephens said they probably don't need any marriage advice from her.

"I don't think they probably need any advice from me. I think they've got it all figured out from what I can tell," the mom of two said.