As a preschool teacher, I love teaching and I love children; so, last night I was like a kid in a candy store – except my candy was a ‘pick n mix’ of star clusters, constellations, planets, and single stars.  Heather and I set up our telescope and were excited to show off the double open star cluster, NGC 884 and NGC 869, that we found in our last lab which is below Cassiopeia and above Perseus.  People were wowed by its beauty. 

      We had them look for the two supergiant suns and compare how one cluster was tighter than the other. Most people were amazed by how many stars there were and how beautiful the two clusters were.  One lady was quite funny she said, while looking through the telescope, “I don’t know what I’m supposed to be looking at, I’m not sure…and I don’t want to say that I didn’t see it,” and the man who was with her said, “How can you NOT see it?!”  It was very funny. One man was very knowledgeable, he had the same kind of telescope at home, after we had discussed this, the clusters had moved out of the frame and he was very kind to help us get the clusters back!  We shared our knowledge with some older kids about what red and blue really means and whether planets/stars are moving towards Earth or away from Earth.  

      After looking at the double cluster one man stood up and said, “Right that’s it – I’m hooked!”  We found that many kids had a tendency to lean on the body of the telescope which moved the double cluster… After a while I saw that Capella had risen and moved the telescope onto it.  It’s very easy to find again so it didn’t matter if anyone accidently moved the telescope; and, I thought that children would enjoy this star so I asked a few nearby if they’d like to have a look.  The children loved Capella’s magical dance in the atmosphere.  They were fixed on its entrancing, color changing beauty, and exclaimed, “Oh it’s pink, purple, it’s like a princess!” and their parents really enjoyed it too. 

      After that I saw that Pleiades had risen far enough above Costco’s lights and we moved the telescope onto it.  People really liked that you could see it faintly in the night sky, then look at it closer in the scope finder, and finally magnified and clearer in the telescope.  It was a great night, lots of fun, and I also got to see Saturn, Venus (on the car drive to the Star Party,) Andromeda, NGC 457, and a nebula!