DIY Harry Potter Escape Room Birthday Party: What I learned.

Okay! The blessed day came and went! I had a great time, and HALF the guests had a great time… (There was one kinda miserable guest, the other of the less-enthused-half had a fine time).

Here’s what I learned:

1. Aim for 10-12 puzzles. Okay. I’m pretty sure I read this online, but I thought, “But how do we know how long each puzzle will take??? Cannot have bored guests! MUST HAVE MORE PUZZLES!” I was wrong. No need for more puzzles. All the girls were engaged (except the one confused one) for the first half of the puzzles. It would have been better to just keep it as it was.
2. Funny and silly were the best. I chose some puzzles to be legit hard. I chose some because they had some interesting element to them. But by far, the favorite puzzles were the silly ones. My daughter’s favorite puzzle was Transfiguration, in which they just had to find the letter in the bottom of the tea cup which was done by tilting the tea cup. I created this puzzle because I thought creating the Transfiguration Room environment would be fun (and it was), but it was FOR SURE the easiest puzzle. And yet, it was her favorite. I also had a hilarious puzzle that involved tasting Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans, and for that one the children who had disengaged came running back into the house to ask to participate as well. There was also one in which someone needed to chug pumpkin juice to get a clue, and that one was simple and well-enjoyed. Meanwhile, the tougher puzzles were less-enjoyed.
3. Best to vet your guests. We had eight people doing one escape room, which meant we needed people who could focus, work hard, and take turns. My daughter didn’t invite some friends whom she really loves because she knew they’d struggle and get bored. Despite this, there was one guest in particular who I honestly suspect has some cognitive problems. She definitely didn’t solve any problems on her own, nor did she contribute to any problem-solving. Even when the other girls explicitly told her what to do, she struggled to follow instructions. (For example, for one task they had to count the number of words on a card. Her friends told her to count the words. She counted the dots. She truly just didn’t get a lot of what was going on). This girl did NOT enjoy the birthday party much at all.
4. Have a theme the kids know. I thought there might be 1-2 guests who didn’t know Harry Potter very well. I was very careful to make sure none of the puzzles required Harry Potter knowledge. But I worked really hard to make the party spot-on thematically (from buying a licensed Sorting Hat to using actual quotes from professors when giving class instructions) that ended up being pointless because the guests (with the exception of one) didn’t know Harry Potter! Oh, and the one who knew Harry Potter? That was the birthday girl. 3-4 guests had minor knowledge of Harry Potter, and the other 3-4 had NO knowledge of Harry Potter.
5. Keep it simple, stupid. I wrote elaborate stories to accompany many of the tasks in the escape room. This was unnecessary, slowed every thing down, and contained a lot of jokes that would only make sense to Harry Potter fans (which the guests of this party were not).
6. Be thoughtful about task placement. If we had a normal-sized crowd, this would not have been as necessary, but with 8 guests, I had to put tasks that needed to be seen by everyone in strategic places so everyone could see.

All-in-all? The birthday girl had a GREAT time! But, I definitely learned a lot and would modify things should I ever host an escape room birthday party again.