Our home in the solar system is a vast collection of stars, gas, and dust that we call the Milky Way galaxy. Galaxies come in different shapes, but the Milky Way is a spiral. Our neighborhood consists of our sun and planets; and lies halfway, about 27,000 light years from the center. We are located on the edge of one of the spirals, called the Orion Arm.  Actually there are eight arms and I'll name them so that you will know: Sagittarius Arm, Scutum Arm, Orion Arm, 3KPC (not sure how they decided on this one), Norma Arm, Centaurus Arm, Carina Arm, and the Perseus Arm.

Although the Milky Way has 200-400 billion stars, the only stars we can see lie in our little corner of the Milky Way. Over thousands of years, humans have wondered about the importance of the pale white glowing band that stretches across the sky. Now we know this is the light from millions of stars that form the disk of the galaxy. We have stars at every stage of their life, from star nurseries, to white dwarf stars nearing the end of their life. Most of the Milky Way's visible mass is stellar material, but 90 percent is invisible "dark matter."

All this is fascinating in itself, and maybe you've heard most of this before, but when have you taken the time to step outside into the darkness just to observe that hazy band across the sky? Well...now is a great time to find a comfortable sport under that dark night sky. You'll have to wait until the moon is out of view because any light will alter what and how much you see. It doesn't matter where you are on Earth, you can look edgewise into the Milky Way this July and early August. If you look at it with your eyes alone, you'll see a hazy band across the sky, but with an ordinary pair of binoculars the "haze" will reveal the myriad of distant stars. If you have a telescope you may be able to distinguish even more stars. The dark clouds within the Milky Way are places where new stars are being born.

Please visit this site to learn more about the Milky Way and our stars:
http://www.universetoday.com/102630/how-many-stars-are-there-in-the-universe/

NOTE: If this inspires you to star-gaze, the Perseids meteor shower takes place on the nights of August 11 and 12th. Mark your calendar. The moon sets by late evening, so at its best, under dark skies, after midnight, you may see scores of stars streaking across the night sky. Don't miss natures fireworks.

References: DK Universe The Definitive Visual Gide, earthsky.org, NASA.org, Universe Today, and the Huffington Post.