The Sweetest Grown-Up Party Game

Two years in a row my husband’s birthday was during a COVID spike (mid January) and we had to do a Zoom party. I created a trivia quiz about him both times! I made a fun PowerPoint and people submitted answers via Google form. I had 2 rounds of general knowledge, and each time the third round was a subjective caption contest, where I found the silliest photos of him throughout his life and everyone submitted their best caption. He then got to judge the best one for each photo!

Is it weird that I want to know the answers to both quizzes?

I’ve just discovered a great game so I want to share it here ! It’s great to do at a dinner party, especially if you don’t know the guests very well, but it works with good friends too.
Here are the rules : Each one share three stories which happened to him/her, and the others must tell which one is a lie. After the person tells his/her 3 stories, the others can ask questions, precisions…

My group of friends does this for birthdays and it is SUCH fun. We make a quiz of about 30 questions with no answers prefilled, pass them out, and give everyone some time to fill in their guesses. Some are real – “What was Dan’s college major”, some are silly “What does Dan actually do at work?”, and some are totally up to chance “Who should play Dan in a movie about his life?”

Then we interview the birthday person live in front of everyone, and they get to pick the correct / silliest / best possible answer. Then we send them home with the hard copies as a little memento. I try to include some heartfelt questions “What makes Dan such a wonderful friend” to make sure they really have something sweet to look back on.

Thanks for sharing! xo

A friend of mine did something like this for me during my baby shower… but there was a twist! All the answers started with the letter “B” and she called the game “B-sides”. It’s kind of funny that so many things in my life are relevant to the letter B! I guess you could pick any letter of the alphabet and find a lot of relevant things? I don’t know. All I know is that a lot of the answers were things like: Brooklyn, Bagels, Boat, etc. She also did a ‘Name That Tune’ where all the songs or artists started with the letter B! It was great.

For my mom’s 60th birthday I got temporary tattoos of her face as party favours! I wish we had also done a quiz!

My bridesmaids did this for me for my bridal shower! They asked my husband a bunch of questions and he’s a totally ham so it was hilarious to watch. I loved it. And what I loved more than anything was that my husband hid it from me so well.

For my mom’s 70th, we played Kay Bingo. My mom has A LOT of sayings, so I put them all into a free bingo generator and we played a bunch of rounds of bingo after her birthday dinner. The most fun part was my siblings and I coming up with all of these saying ahead of time. We had a blast and everyone was in hysterics as we called each saying out.

Oh my gosh, that top photo of your family, where that little girl is reaching for a kiss from her dad ❤️

I also have a bachelorette version. One friend is in charge of asking the bride’s partner 10 complete-the-sentence questions about the bride, like “my fave thing about Jane is ___,” or “When I get home and see Jane after a long day I’m so ____”. She writes down the answers. Then at the party, all the guests are asked to try to guess what the bride’s partner’s answer to each question was. For example, the groom might have said “relieved” for the long day question, but friends might guess “hungry”, “happy”, “horny”, etc (you can see the potential for laughs). The friend in charge then collects and reads all the answers to each question back to the group, one question at a time, mixing the true answers in there as well. And the bride has to guess: which one was the actual answer of her partner? If she guesses one of the fake answers submitted by a guest, that guest gets a point. At the end of the game, the guest with the most points wins a prize. This game avoids the awkwardness of not knowing the couple well because everything is anonymous, and answers can be purposefully silly just for laughs. It’s both sweet and funny- I’ve done it for every friend since it was done for me!

love this – obviously you guys know how to have fun and build relationships :)
Those family photos are so great, too. We mostly have studio photos where everyone looks stiff.

We had three generations at a family reunion lake cabin and our quiz took the form of a TV game show, Jeopardy. We put Post-it notes in a grid on a large poster board, with categories across the top. The Post-it notes had dollar amounts on one side and the questions on the hidden side.

Two of us planned the game and casually gathered information throughout the week when we were sitting privately with family members. (You could also ask people to write their own questions, I suppose.) We made some “gimme” questions harder by asking for minute details: e.g. Everyone knows Steve worked at a record store in college but THIS is the EXACT name of the store when he left in 1986.

Some of the categories and example questions:
* FIRST JOBS: In college, this person worked in a lab determining the sex of insects. Answer: Who is Aunt Judi? (Trust me, the answer was surprising and hilarious.)

* LOVE AND MARRIAGE – Covered things like how couples met, what their first dates were (funny and cute), wedding themes/colors, etc.

* FAMILY TIES – These five family members all played on high school baseball teams. Name these eight family members who took piano lessons.

We used buzzers from other games and divided into teams, mixing up different families and generations. I don’t remember if we had a prize or not for the winning team, beyond bragging rights, but the true prize was getting to know our far-flung family members.

The (unintentional, I think) heart formation in the top photo of you family!!!!

I am a high school art teacher and I play a version of this game with my classes the first week of school. I give them a “quiz” on me. My favorite food/season/color, how many pets I have, Am I a morning or night person, etc. They have so much fun guessing and then we go over the answers together. It’s a fun bonding activity and a great way for them to get to know me.

I’m dying to know the answers to Caroline’s quiz! Such a cool game.

We always play “stop the bus” (no idea why it’s called that!) Everyone receives the same amount of pieces of paper – say 10, everyone draws a picture of literally anything, pass to the person on your right, they write in words what they see on the next piece of paper and put the drawing to the bottom of their pile, pass to the next person who draws what is written then puts the written sheet to the bottom of their pile and so on until all the paper in the piles are used up
One by one the group reveals how far the drawings/descriptions have veered from the original drawing. It’s always HILARIOUS!
Also it’s great for a group of different aged players – in fact a few kids in the group make the results even funnier. We have played at Christmas with an 82 yr old and a 6 yr old in the group! So long as you can write, you can play!
My 14 year old played it last weekend with his friends at his birthday sleepover and I could hear the laughter from across the house! (Dread to think what the drawings involved ;)

Different but related: for my 30th birthday, my sister in law contacted my close family and friends and asked them their favorite thing about me. She then wrote all of them down on 30 strips of paper and put them in a jar. It is one of my most treasured possessions and we have turned it into a family tradition. I made one for my husband a few months later, we made one for my brother this year, and my sister is next! One of my favorites was written by my husband: “I love that you are a wise old owl with a fine ass.” See?! Laugh and cry!

Was your dad’s dog’s name Foxtrot??… MY dog’s name is Foxtrot <3

We play a nice ice breaker game combining our two favorite classics.
It’s a combination of charades and taboo. It’s simple but wayyy more entertaining. When we started……Black Panther had just come out. Wakanda was a popular choice of word. Haha.

How to play:
1.) Everyone gets a designated amount of pieces of paper and on each slip writes down one word (I allow two if it’s a person). Then split the group into two teams.
2.) In the first round you play like taboo except no words are off limits. You just want your teammates to guess the words. Alternate between teams until there are no more words left in the bowl. Count your points and then put the words back in the bowl.
3.) In the second round you have to act out the words and repeat until there are no more words.
4.) In the last round you go back to taboo but this time you can only say one word to describe your word. If the other team catches you saying a filler word (i.e um, uh, ohh…..etc.) that counts as your word and your teammates then have to run through all the words in the game to basically guess what that word actually was before you can go onto the new word.

It’s funny, filled with quick inside jokes, and great for your memory!

I’ve played my own version of this game with so many friends and so many times, I wrote a book for it!
https://www.amazon.com/Fill-Me-Part-Journal-Yours/dp/1501194798/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1541725813&sr=8-4&keywords=fill+me+in+journal

I don’t even know these answers about myself.

My friends had a fun get-to-know-you game during cocktail hour of their wedding where each person got a bingo card with different descriptors in the squares, e.g. “grew up in Hawaii” or “likes to rock climb,” as well as a unique stamp. Whenever you came across another guest who fit a descriptor you’d have them stamp that box on your card, and whoever got to 5 in a row by the end of the night would get a prize. It was such a fun and unique way to encourage guests to strike up conversation and meet new people!

Wait– so was he in the delivery room or not?! Now I need to know all the answers to both quizzes.

This is a great idea for Thanksgiving dinner or even dinner with friends!

A friend of mines mother-in-law hosted the ‘rehearsal’ dinner the night before the wedding. It was very casual and a good portion of the wedding guests were invited as many people on the ‘sides’ did not know each other at all. About 2-3 weeks before the party, she sent an email asking you to send in a short but little known funny fact about yourself. Once at the party we were given a sheet with the fact and had to find the person that matched it. It was so much fun and it was a lovely way to interact with everyone, it wasn’t couple centric and it made for great conversations and familiarity at the wedding itself, which was Amazing.
I have never forgotten how warm and friendly it made the whole next day’s events. The brides cousin mowed Leonard Cohens lawn a few times!