Don’t let the title Secret Lives of Stars fool you: This has nothing to do with Hollywood gossip. Instead, this planetarium special is all about the stars in the night sky, from the massive to the tiny.

Sir Patrick Stewart (Star Trek: The Next Generation and X-Men) narrates the show, explaining the difference between planetary nebulas and supernovas and the like.

Price:$8.

Holiday in the Woodlands

The Woodlands Town Center

10001 Woodloch Forest
Spring,TX 77380

Daily until January 20th

Stroll through a spectacular fantasyland of light displays and glide across the ice at the Holiday in the Woodlands. The Donoho’s Jewelers Winter Wonderland, an array of holiday scenes illuminated with thousands of lights, surrounds the Woodlands Outdoor Ice Rink. The Wonderland includes decorated snowmen, angels, elves, toy soldiers and more. The rink, among the largest outdoor ice rinks in the region, conducts skate sessions for families. Navigate around the displays and shops on the Waterway Trolleys and the Waterway Cruisers; both are offering rides during the holidays.

Dates and times vary. For information, call 281-419-5630 or visit thewoodlandsicerink.com.

Price: Free to $10.50.

 

Russian Holiday Bazaar

Russian Cultural Center “Our Texas”

2337 Bissonnet, Houston, TX 77005

November 18, 2013 – January 15, 2014

Monday-Friday: 8:30 a.m. – 5:00p.m., Saturday: 11:00a.m. – 3:00p.m.

We offer a broad assortment of unique gifts that will satisfy the most demanding tastes. We have wooden figures of Father Frost and beautiful icons. There are lovely lacquer jewelry boxes, hand-painted with the Russian fairy-tale motifs and intricately carved containers made of birch bark. We also have vintage porcelain figurines by the famous Lomonosov (Imperial) Factory and golden wooden tableware called “Khokhloma.”Plus we have the famous Russian Matreshkas or nesting dolls.

Price: FREE!

 

Strawberry Picking at Blessington Farms

December 07, 2013 – May 03, 2014 (Every Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday) from 10am-3:30pm

Blessington Farms

510 Chisholm Road, Simonton, TX 77476

Gather the family and head over to Blessington Farms for u-pick strawberries! Enjoy picking and eating the most delicious strawberries. There are also lots of other Farm Funland festivities like hay rides, giant slides, pedal cars, chicken encounter, barrel train rides, hay maze and more. Blessington Farms is located 40 miles west of downtown Houston. Road trip!

Price: 

Strawberries $5/pound

$8/person for Farm Funland. (Children under 18 months enter for free)

 

The Age of Impressionism: Great French Paintings from the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute

December 22, 2013 – March 23, 2014 (Recurring daily)

Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (Beck Building)

1001 Bissonnet, Houston, TX 77005

The acclaimed international tour of The Age of Impressionism: Great French Paintings from the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute concludes in Houston at the MFAH. Showcasing the Clark’s renowned holdings of French Impressionist painting, this exhibition features 73 works of art by a stellar lineup that includes Edgar Degas, Édouard Manet, Claude Monet, Berthe Morisot, Camille Pissarro, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and Alfred Sisley. Also represented are Pierre Bonnard, William-Adolphe Bouguereau, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Jean-Léon Gérôme, Jean-François Millet, and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.

The Clark launched the collection tour in 2011 at the Palazzo Reale in Milan, coinciding with a three-year expansion of the Clark’s Williamstown, Massachusetts, facility. The MFAH is only the second, and the final, U.S. museum to host the exhibition.

This spectacular presentation tells not only the story of Sterling and Francine Clark’s devotion and passion for collecting but also of painting in 19th-century France, from the Orientalist works of Gérôme; to the Barbizon paintings of Corot and Théodore Rousseau; to the Impressionist masterpieces of Degas, Manet, Monet, Pissarro, Renoir, and Sisley; and concluding with the Early Modern output of Bonnard and Lautrec. Portraits, landscapes, marines, still life, and scenes of everyday life by 25 artists, spanning 70 years, are all on view.

Price: Free on Thursdays; Not free otherwise

 

Mozart’s Jupiter Symphony

From: January 03, 2014 – January 05, 2014 (Recurring daily)

Houston Symphony

Jan. 3rd- 4th at 8PM; Jan. 5th at 2:30PM

Celebrate the New Year with two of classical music’s great superstars. First Mozart, who’s brilliance shines through in his sublime final symphony. In the Jupiter, drama, joy and energy are presented with the composer’s trademark elegance. The program opens by turning up the heat with the equally exciting Fire Symphony by Haydn.

Program:
Haydn: Symphony No. 59, Fire
Schnittke: Moz-Art á la Haydn- for two violins and chamber ensemble
Mozart: Symphony No. 41, Jupiter

Artist: Andrés Orozco-Estrada, conductor; Eric Halen, violin

 Price: It ain’t free…