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JANUARY 2012. A new year is a good time to read about our calendar, in which January is the start of the year. January is also the month in which NASA's rovers Spirit and Opportunity landed on Mars eight years ago for a 3-month mission! Spirit was lost to us last year, you can read her story.

If you live far enough to the north, you've been seeing the Northern Lights recently - there's an article about what causes them. Even if we don't see aurorae, we can look at the winter sky, and there's an intro to winter skywatching as well as articles on the constellations of Orion (my favorite!) and Auriga. [I should apologize to people in the southern hemisphere for this bias, but after all you are having summer, instead of freezing.]

There are 3 articles related to anniversaries in the next month. Johann Bode (born January 19, 1747) discovered the asteroid Ceres on New Year's Day 1801. Clyde Tombaugh (February 4, 1906 � January 17, 1997) discovered Pluto.

This evening Jupiter was bright overhead and Venus was brilliant low in the sky. It seemed like a good idea to recommend my guide to telling planets from UFOs.

Astronomy Editor Picks

JULY 2012 You can find out about Eris and Pluto, two distant dwarf planets. They're often called twins, but they aren't much alike.

The Perseid meteor shower is expected to peak after midnight on August 12th and 13th - you can find out more about this annual event. And for general summer observing, there's an introduction to the summer skies and a special look at Cygnus, my favorite summer constellation.

The anniversary of the first Moon landing comes up on July 20. The autobiography by Michael Collins � the Apollo 11 astronaut who didn't walk on the Moon � is a good read.

If you have any budding astronomers, the long summer holiday could be a good time to read about the stars and planets. And it could also be a good time for any member of the family to join a citizen science project.

Read about the sad end of the best laid plans of astronomer Guillaume LeGentil who didn't get any measurements of the Transit of Venus in 1761 or in 1769.

There's also a tour of the canine-inspired parts of the sky and a chance to learn more about Saturn's moons. A complement to the Cassini images that we keep seeing!