Morning Welcome

You know those mornings you wake up and don't want to get up but don't have a good reason to stay in bed? This morning I got up anyway, and here's what I saw in the eastern sky. What a beautiful morning welcome from the Creator!

Actually, this picture isn't exactly what I saw. Venus was to the left of the crescent moon, and toward the right (south), like loosely strung beads, were Pollux, Procyon, Sirius, Betelgeuse and Bellatrix, followed high in the sky by Jupiter.

How do I know what stars I was seeing?

I have this lovely little program on my computer called Stellarium. You just set your coordinates (you can do that by choosing the closest city) and then you are looking at the sky just as it appears outside. Just point at any spot in the sky and it will tell you what you see. It is possible to do many other things with it, of course, and best of all, it is a FREE download. Just go to www.stellarium.org and choose your operating system.