When I was a kid, I would pray for snow days so I could stay home from school and spend the day throwing snowballs at friends, sledding, making snow angels and ice skating.

I am not sure when exactly I started to dislike winter, but anyone who knows me knows I am not a fan of this time of year. I am quite sure it has something to do with getting older. I would grumble about the cold, the snow and ice, the blustery days, not to mention having to shovel the snow at home and at work.

I would find myself complaining about slippery conditions when walking or driving. On the other hand, I have to admit that I genuinely enjoy the other three seasons here in Pennsylvania.

As I type this article, the snow flurries whirl past my office window, and while I will grumble about it, I do have to admit there is beauty in those falling flakes.

Of course, I had to get the camera and take photos the other day when it snowed after Thanksgiving. It was pretty and I could appreciate that snowfall because I didn’t have to drive in it and there wasn’t enough to shovel.

When I got out of my car this morning and the snowflakes were gently dropping onto my nose and eyelashes, I found myself humming. And I wondered if I really understood what was happening around me. I glanced up at the sky and decided to find out. I had always thought that snowflakes were frozen raindrops, but that’s not the case at all!

What I learned was that snowflakes form when water vapor freezes to a particle of dust, pollen or some other material up in the clouds. As this tiny ice particle called a seed crystal starts its journey through the atmosphere, more water vapor freezes to it. This seed crystal then becomes a snow crystal.

As more water vapor freezes, the molecules line up, forming a unique pattern and developing its unique shape. Because there are as many as 100,000 water vapor droplets involved in the formation of one snowflake it makes sense that the connections and arrangements will all vary as the snowflake increases in size. And more water vapor means those six sides will start to create “branches” resulting in the lacy appearance known as snowflakes.

All of this depends on temperature, how much water vapor is up in the atmosphere, wind speed and other factors.

It is agreed upon by scientists that no two snow crystals react to the atmosphere in the same way so that’s what makes each one different. For over 40 years, Wilson “Snowflake” Bentley (1865–1931) photographed thousands of individual snowflakes and perfected the innovative photomicrographic techniques. His photographs and publications provide valuable scientific records of snow crystals and identified approximately 35 different types of snowflakes.

One research scientist at Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto, Japan, who studies snowflakes, was quoted as saying that the processes that give snowflakes their uniqueness are poorly understood. For example, scientists are uncertain why crystals take different shapes at different temperatures and do not know precisely how temperature and humidity affect growth.

I like to collect interesting facts about all sorts of subjects, hoping for the precise moment when I can toss out that random fact in the middle of a conversation. I did that very thing when chatting with a visitor today and he commented on the show swirling around outside. I explained to him that I was writing an article about snowflakes and couldn’t wait to blurt out the coolest fact I had just learned:

Every winter season, 1 septillion snowflakes drop down onto the earth. Just how much is that? It’s a “trillion trillion” - or a one followed by 24 zeros.

What either of us is ever going to do with that information, I have no idea.

Jeannie Carl is a naturalist at the Carbon County Environmental Education Center in Summit Hill. The center rehabilitates injured animals and educates the public on a variety of wildlife found in the area. For information on the Carbon County Environmental Center, visit www.carboneec.org.