I forgot I had bought these glow in the dark stars/planets for the kids at the dollar store last December. I finally gave them to the kids after our planets unit. They're on the ceiling above the kids' beds.
And I'm really sad that I missed it, but last Friday Jupiter, Venus, and a waxing crescent moon were all in alignment. Mercury can also be seen closer to the horizon but I couldn't see if from where I was. And if I had had a good telescope I might have been able to see Uranus too, which kind of blows my mind. Mars is up in the sky right now to the east. Actually, I'm going outside right now to see if I can find it.
Well, I can just see too many stars from where I live so it's kind of hard to tell which one is a planet. And even when I look on a map it looks kind of difficult to find and it's really cold outside. I don't really want to go back.
Anyway, here are my photos of the planets almost in alignment. Awesome. (One of the perks of homeschooling is I get to attend the classes too and I feel like I am learning so many awesome things.) Jupiter is the planet to the left of the moon just a bit, and Venus is farther down in the photo.
The kids (and even Derek) came out to look at the planets with me too. They thought is was really cool. But Abigail kept asking when we were going to see "satren." I think we'll be able to see it in August, but I'll have to look that up. I've seen Saturn before and have even seen the rings, but that was through a pretty good telescope and you have to get it on the right year, so I'll have to find out what we can get this year, if anything.
Below is a photo I took just a few seconds ago - when I decided not to find Mars. If I had a better camera you would be able to see the "earth shadow" which is when you can see the bright crescent of the moon, but also the rest of the outline of the moon quite a bit dimmer. The bright light is obviously light coming from the sun reflecting to us, but the dim light is light from the sun reflecting off the earth and onto the moon and back to us. Kind of neat, I think. In this photo, however, all you get is blur.
Just in case you are interested, if you live in the western US there will be a solar eclipse coming May 20th. You need to get special eclipse glasses if you want to see it but not fry your eyes at the same time. Info is here for Utahns but you might be able to find info specific to your location via google. Sounds interesting.
And I'm really sad that I missed it, but last Friday Jupiter, Venus, and a waxing crescent moon were all in alignment. Mercury can also be seen closer to the horizon but I couldn't see if from where I was. And if I had had a good telescope I might have been able to see Uranus too, which kind of blows my mind. Mars is up in the sky right now to the east. Actually, I'm going outside right now to see if I can find it.
Well, I can just see too many stars from where I live so it's kind of hard to tell which one is a planet. And even when I look on a map it looks kind of difficult to find and it's really cold outside. I don't really want to go back.
Anyway, here are my photos of the planets almost in alignment. Awesome. (One of the perks of homeschooling is I get to attend the classes too and I feel like I am learning so many awesome things.) Jupiter is the planet to the left of the moon just a bit, and Venus is farther down in the photo.
The kids (and even Derek) came out to look at the planets with me too. They thought is was really cool. But Abigail kept asking when we were going to see "satren." I think we'll be able to see it in August, but I'll have to look that up. I've seen Saturn before and have even seen the rings, but that was through a pretty good telescope and you have to get it on the right year, so I'll have to find out what we can get this year, if anything.
Happy Star Gazing!
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