Aren’t I glad I get the Time Out London email newsletter? Aren’t YOU glad I do??

Well Time Out London is offering a voucher for 2-for-1 entry to the ‘John Baldessari: Pure Beauty‘ exhibition at Tate Modern through 13th November.

I love the Tate Modern, as previously mentioned in my post Mummy Daddy Date Night: Late Nights at the Museums. If you go on Friday or Saturday night you can do the late night thing AND use this voucher!

Print out your voucher here and go get some culture!

About the exhibition, from the Tate Modern website:

Based in Los Angeles since the 1960s, John Baldessari (b. 1931) is one of the most influential artists of his generation. Making his name as a pioneer of conceptual art in the 1960s with his text and image paintings, he shocked the art world when he announced in a newspaper that he was cremating all the artworks he had produced between 1953 and 1966. He then turned his attention to photographic works often incorporating found film stills, trawling dumpsters for discarded material from which he created his famous photo-compositions.

Baldessari’s lifelong interest in language, both written and visual, has been at the forefront of both his artwork and his teaching, through which, over more than thirty years, he has nurtured and influenced succeeding generations of artists. His work has had a huge influence on Cindy Sherman, David Salle, and Barbara Kruger among others. His works incorporate wit and irony, both mocking conceptual art and delivering it in his written work I Will Not Make Any More Boring Art; superimposing media images and painting with his trademark dots and over-painted figures in The Duress Series; and exploring the idea of subliminal images in advertising in his sequence of ice cubes containing the words of his name, ‘U-BUY BAL DES SARI‘.

A great thing about living in London is that some of the world’s best museums are free. To truly take advantage, plan an evening visit away from the hordes of tourists and school field trips.

One of our favourite cheap dates is wandering around the nearly empty exhibits at the Tate Modern on a Saturday night and then treating ourselves to a glass of wine. The members bar has a lovely view so if you have any friends with memberships see if you can borrow their card!

Here is a clip ‘n save guide to late night hours at London’s museums (click for large size):

On Saturday, Zoom In/Zoom Out, a free event at the National Portrait Gallery, will give kids the chance to create their own artwork alongside professional artists on a fantastic large scale art project in the gallery as part of the city-wide Big Draw Campaign. The event runs from 1-4 in the Main Hall. According to View London:

A fun activity that is suitable for children, teenagers and their families, the Big Draw at National Portrait Gallery event is just one of the activities taking place around London to celebrate the Big Draw. Collaborate on a large scale drawing led by artists Emma Middleton and Grace Adam. The event is free and no booking is required.

On Sunday, join Time to Change’s Get Moving in Regent’s Park from 1-4 for a festival of dance to support World Mental Health Day. The Time to Change campaign to end mental health stigma aims to highlight the role of physical activitiy in boosting mental wellbeing. According to the website:

Take part in dance workshops of different styles from around the world including ceroc, capoeria, bellydancing, bollywood, and more. Join our celebrity supporters including new World Triple-Jump Champion Phillips Idowu and former-children’s TV presenter Dave Benson Phillips in supporting Time to Change, listen to fantastic music from Blake, relax in the BBC Headroom tent or try one of their drumming workshops, and learn from Britain’s Got Talent’s bellydancing finalist Sophie Mei!

It promises to be a fantastic day out, and it couldn’t be easier to kick start an active lifestyle than by dancing and meeting lots of people.All ages and abilities welcome.

Home-made picture frames are a great gift for kids to make. See a sample of one we made for Poppy for her birthday in the picture above.

1. Pick up cheap, unfinished wood picture frames from Ikea. The ones we used were in packs of two for about £1–I can’t remember the exact price. See a larger version of what we used here.

2. Set up paint, beads, buttons, sequins, glitter, stickers, ribbons, feathers or anything else you’ve got extras of. Shops like Paperchase also have great supplies for this project.

3. Let the little ones go wild, providing assistance with the glue as necessary.

4. Once the glue has set (give it a good 24+ hours to be safe), pop in a picture of the artist and you’re finished!

Making magazine beads is another fun project that costs nothing. All you need is some old magazines or wrapping paper, scissors, glue, a toothpick and some string.

1. Cut the magazine pages into long strips, wide at one end coming to a point at the other.
2. Lay the paper pretty side down and put glue on the pointy end to about a quarter of the length.
3. Roll the paper around the toothpick (or skewer or other skinny stick) starting at the wide end.
4. Secure the sticky end and ta-da…beads!
5. Once you have made several beads, string them to make a necklace or bracelet.

If this is difficult to picture, check out the great instructions I found on WikiHow, Paper University or Alpha Mom, where I borrowed this picture.

Making new crayons out of old ones is fun, easy and really costs nothing if you’ve got lots of broken bits of crayon around the house.

1. Take all of your old crayons, peel off any paper and break them into small pieces.
2. Let the kids place them in muffin tins, in any colour combination they like—pink and purple for girly girls, shades of blue for the sea, a little bit of everything, a rainbow.
3. Pop them in the oven at low heat and keep an eye on them. They should take about 15-20 minutes to melt but you want to take them out as soon as they are soupy.
4. Stick the tray in the freezer for about an hour and they should come right out.
5. Do some art!

If you want a posh instruction guide for doing this, try Martha Stewart’s version! I also like the instructions on the cute website Make and Takes, which is where I got the picture I used in this post.