The end of December marked the start of changing of seasons. This is the Winter Solstice. Those softly falling leaves that were swirling around in colors of browns and reds and oranges and yellows are now coated in a fine layer of frost. Christmas has come and passed, it is no longer autumn and the start of a new year.

Winter Solstice marks the beginning of the winter season in the Northern half of the Hemisphere here on our planet, earth. At exactly 12:30 am EST (05:30 UTC) on December 22^nd, 2011 the winter season began in the Northern Hemisphere and the summer season began in the Southern Hemisphere.

On December 21^st, (at exactly 66.5 degrees North and South of the equator, respectively) North of the Arctic Circle, the land was plunged into 24 hours of darkness. South of the Antarctic Circle, there was a continuous 24 hours of daylight.

This phenomenon occurred, because the earth is tilted on an axis. This axis runs straight through our planet from the North to South Poles at 23.5 degrees. If the earth wasn’t tilted, we wouldn’t have the four seasons (spring, summer, autumn, winter).  The sun would shine directly over the equator all year long. Ironically, (in the midst of our summer season up here, in the Northern Hemisphere) July 3^rd marks the aphelion, which is the point where the earth is farthest away from the sun. Conversely, when a planet is closest to the sun, this is called the perihelion. This is a direct translation from the Greek words “peri”, which means “near” and “helios”, which means “sun”.