Today:
As the star Arcturus climbs to one third of the way above the eastern horizon at 11:00 PM this, look for another brilliant star to return to the skies, the bluish-white Vega, just rising in the north-northeast. Vega appears on any clear night of the year, but shifts into evening skies in the Spring.
Tuesday:
The brightest star in the sky, Sirius, sparkles in the south as twilight fades by 8:00 PM, sliding into the southwest through the course of the evening, one of the first stars out as twilight fades. Its brilliance is due, in part to its relative closeness, only 8.6 light years away, as well as putting out about 25 times more light than our Sun.
Wednesday:
At 9:45 this evening, due south and two-thirds above the southern horizon, a tiny patch of starlight sits between the stars called the Twins of Gemini toward the south-southwest, and the bluish-white star marking the heart of Leo the Lion, Regulus. This faint, fuzzy group appears like a tiny swarm of bees, giving it the name, the Beehive Cluster.