LydMc

My husband and I love escape rooms. So much so, in fact, that I started putting together a list of all the local offerings complete with links, pricing and themes. It's proved so useful, I thought others wishing to explore the escape rooms of the Sacramento area might be interested, as well.  ABOUT THE REVIEWS Every franchise offers something a little different, which is great! On this page, I'm mostly detailing the basics, including rooms, cost and general impression. In my full reviews, I try to note what makes each place unique, including but not limited to: costumes, leaderboards, props, photo ops, puzzles, room themes, timers, hints, fun and cost. The vast majority of these places I would happily recommend and return to if they had more rooms to try. Unless otherwise stated, all rooms were played as a team of two (my husband and I). While I will mention a few specifics, I will make sure everything is spoiler-free because I don't want to ruin the fun!  Without further...

As of April, we have finished every (current) room this venue offers! Most were good fun with thoughtful puzzles, and we'll likely come back in the future as they mentioned replacing one of the rooms with a new one later this year.  Escape Out  - Folsom Time Machine:   2–6 players, Easy/Moderate Single room where you have to self-destruct a faulty time machine. Rated as one of their easiest rooms, but wound up being difficult and unintuitive because of the busy/overwhelming setting and how multiple puzzles/objects did not work as they should. Had potential, but sadly disappointed. Solved with 5 minutes to spare, 3 hints! Heist Society:   2–12 players, Moderate/Challenging Multi-room where you need to break into a secret spy headquarters to retrieve a treasured artifact. Fun theme, good, immersive settings and thoughtful, doable puzzles. We enjoyed the variety of puzzles and clues, and a few clever surprises along the way (no spoilers!). Solved with 6 minutes to spare...

We finally made it out to the escape room most consistently recommended by other people in our area, and it did not disappoint. As a testament to its quality, Enchambered was also voted best escape room in the nation for 2023!  Enchambered  - Sacramento Rooms:  So far, we've only played the one, but it was great! The settings was completely immersive with sound effects (sometimes on the loud side), fully decorated in the theme of the story which was awesome. Puzzles and props were well-suited for the theme without red herrings. And apparently every room has a pair of gloves as a fun, little Easter egg. Containment Breach:  3 – 8 players, Medium (as rated by venue) An abandoned lab you must explore to discover what happened to the scientist who disappeared...! Puzzles were plentiful, diverse and fun to figure out. Solved with 5 people (and 2 dogs!) with 20 minutes to spare, 3 hints!  Skull Witch:   3–8 players, Expert A witch's hut with spooky (but...

This is the second venue we explored in our escape room journey, where we brought two other puzzle-loving members of our family for their first escape room experience ever. Once again, we were not disappointed and already look forward to coming back to try all the remaining rooms.  Beat the Room  - Rocklin Rooms:  All the rooms we've tried so far have been fun, immersive and engaging. Some are single room (did not feel cramped) and some are multi-room. Captain’s Quarters:  2–8 players, Intermediate-Beginner (as rated by venue) Pirate-themed single room with great, immersive setting, fun props and plenty of puzzles to occupy four people, though it also would have been doable with two. We finished surprisingly fast, not because the puzzles were overly easy, just because we had a lot of clever people working on them. Solved with 4 people in 25.12 minutes, 0 hints! (Top of the leaderboard!) Bitten: (90 minutes)   4–10 players, Expert Vampire-themed multi-r...

As of February 2024, my husband and I have officially finished all the escape rooms at Red Door Sacramento! This was the first venue we went to when starting our escape room quest, and needless to say, it got us hooked.  Below is the comprehensive breakdown of our experience (sans spoilers!) so you can get a feel for what they have to offer.  Red Door Escape Room  - Sacramento  Technically located in Rancho Cordova, this escape room is in the same building as the Old Spaghetti Factory right next to Highway 50. It's part of a franchise so they have other locations across the country, some with different episodes! For now, this review is just about the Sacramento location. Rooms:  Every single room was awesome. The settings were unique and well-tailored to the themes, and every room was technically a multi-room with multiple spaces to explore/escape . Listed in the order we visited... The Gift:  2–8 players, 8/10 difficulty (as rated by the venue) B...

Yum Yes! Fancy that, the Sushiwoks are on an infographic featuring Sushi Around the World! Visit the CheapFlights link below for full resolution! They thought I/the Sushiwoks were Canadian at first (perhaps I'm just that nice, eh?), but it all worked out in the end.  ...Eh? Thanks to Cheapflights.com.au for including Sushiwoks in the tour of international delicacies!

Flyer courtesy of NaNoWriMo You think writing blogs is fun? Try writing a novel. Like, seriously, try writing a novel! It is National Novel Writing Month after all. If you haven't heard of it before, the goal of National Novel Writing Month (a.k.a. NaNoWriMo ) is to sit down and finally finish that novel that's been swimming around in your head for years. Or alternatively, to start a new idea and chase it to the end. The challenge itself: write 50,000 words in one month, which is approximately 1667 words a day. Difficult? Yes. Ridiculous? Sometimes. Worth it? Um, YES! Writers, start your engines! It's true, 50,000 words in a month is quite the challenge, and the first two times I attempted NaNoWriMo, I barely made it halfway through. Still, I was 20-30K more words along than I would have been in an average month of writing. And, like they say, third time's the charm. Since I like to start NaNoWriMo with no plan at all (as I get to discover a whole ne...

Mawwage is what bwings us togevver today... There are few occasions more exciting than a wedding. Not only do two people in love pledge to keep loving and caring for each other forever, but it's also a great time for family and friends to gather, meet and eventually return home with even more family and friends than before. The source of this ponderance?  This very weekend, my brother Joey married my beautiful, wonderful new sister-in-law Melinda! YAY! :D Wood you marry me? To help personalize the celebration, Melinda asked me to paint some crafty wooden cake toppers for the wedding. Apparently the concept is not new, as she got the idea and the wooden bride and groom dolls from Etsy. You can get them personalized and pre-painted, too, but this way they were extra meaningful. Dress up time The general plan for these wedding cake toppers was to make simplistic representations of both the bride and groom. You can see from my sketch in the background, th...