Good wishes for a bright Winter Solstice :)

[Toddy]

It's all brighter from here onwards

I hope your own day is warm and bright, and you have time to just breathe the fresh air and look forward to longer days.

M

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December Solstice: the Shortest (and Longest) Day

The December solstice is the shortest day the Northern Hemisphere. South of the equator, it's the longest day.

www.timeanddate.com

 

[William_Montgomery]

Happy Yule to you. Enjoy those brighter days ahead.

 

[TLM]

Today we have here 5h 46m official daylight.

 

[Pattree]

And to you Toddy.

I too wish everyone a happy time.

 

[Toddy]

Today we have here 5h 46m official daylight.

Technically we're supposed to have 8hr 1m.....but the reality is nearer six hours of light you can actually see your feet when walking.

 

[John Fenna]

A good Winter Celebration to you all!
Stay safe and happy
Boy am I looking forward to the return of the sun!

 

[TLM]

Technically we're supposed to have 8hr 1m.....but the reality is nearer six hours of light you can actually see your feet when walking.

Here it really depends on snow, when on ground it is rarely truly dark but when the ground is bare and sky clouded it is kind of twilight all day. The real twilight though is in the north where sun does not rise at all but there is still some light.

 

[Pattree]

Yes indeed, there is a big difference here in the UK Midlands between Dawn and Sunrise. With a clear sky we don’t legally need to use vehicle headlights from twenty minutes before sunrise until twenty minutes after sunset. Other than in a vehicle you can see in the dusk for another twenty minutes before you need artificial light. However it’s been cloudy for months and yesterday we had house lights on all day.

I love the Midwinter celebration. For me it’s a huge lift. We do it big time!

(Not all of us enjoy the Summer more than the Winter. Now is my most active and creative time,)

 

[JonathanD]

Let’s hope we see more of the sun next year. Seemed it was a bit shy in 24.

 

[shibafu]

Fun fact: it's already been getting lighter in the evenings for about a week. But in the mornings, sunrise will carry on getting later for a week or so after today. I did read an explanation once of why the earliest sunset and latest sunrise are about a fortnight apart, and didn't understand it at all.

 

[Pattree]

I’m not sure that this datum is useful and it’s very little to do with the Solstice but:

8pm GMT on 6th of December 80% of the world’s population were experiencing darkness (or rather - the sun below the horizon to be more exact). Headline read - the darkest day. Hardly!

This is because most of us live on half the world and the Pacific lives on the other.

 

[bearbait]

A Cool Yule to you all.

And let's hope that the lengthening days here in the North, at least, bring a little brightness in the coming year to all the living things sharing our planet...

 

[Brizzlebush]

Fun fact: it's already been getting lighter in the evenings for about a week. But in the mornings, sunrise will carry on getting later for a week or so after today. I did read an explanation once of why the earliest sunset and latest sunrise are about a fortnight apart, and didn't understand it at all.

I've never understood it.
I always celebrate the winter solstice and the coming of longer days. I'll fill the house with as many candles as i can find! Yet the longest nights are still, er, long.
Or rather, the days don't actually get any longer until the 25th, when they're 1min longer, at least where I live. Then gradually longer, then rapidly longer. It's always fascinating to me.
I'd never noticed the time of dawn changing, so that helps, thank you. Even if all this cosmic, planetary malarkey is beyond my ken.

 

[Pattree]

We in the northern hemisphere have more long nights around the winter solstice and fewer long days around the Summer Solstice than folk in the southern hemisphere. This is because the Earth’s orbit is slightly egg shaped and we experience Winter at the fat end and whip around the thin end in Summer. Antipodeans experience the opposite.

The length of daytime (sunrise to sunset) is different from the much more variable length of daylight (dawn to dusk). Weather, particularly cloud cover, make significant differences to total daylight.

So:
The shortest day of the Northern year was 21st December.
The darkest day of the year will be very variable and somewhat subjective.

 

[Woody girl]

Well, I'm a bit late for solstice blessings, but I wish you all a happy Christmas and hope the new year brings you all a better life than you already have.

 

[Pattree]

You too.