This December is an excellent month for watching planets, and you can do it no matter where you live and with the unaided eye. However I can only tell you how to find them in the northern hemisphere since that is where I live. Light as long as it isn't a few feet away from you shouldn't effect you, and in fact having light will help. At night your eyes focus on collecting light and your color receptors don't work, so light will turn them back on to help you recognize color in the planets.

When the sun sets, first out is Venus. Venus should be already up in the sky, much larger and brighter then any other star so it should be the first thing you see. It is more yellowish then the usual white star. Venus will start sinking till it hits the horizon, but before it does that, Mars will appear nearly on the opposite side of the sky in a clearly orange glow, quite unlike any star. Mars will travel quite high in the sky to the point of being nearly directly above you at one point(this will vary at how north you are). Mars should be about 4/5 the size of Venus and was at is brightest point for more then a decade at Nov 7, 2005 and is still bright; and with it you should see Saturn. Saturn has a blue-ish glow but remains mostly yellow-white. Fast forward time toward the morning hours, and you should see Jupiter, larger then Saturn and redish. All these planets should be distincly larger and different collored then normal stars, and if you have a telescope, you can see saturn's rings before they turn head on towards us. You should also try training your scope on the moon, I found it great for learning how to focus your view and the craters are quite clear and sometimes show remarkable features such as seeing a crater wall on the dark side of a part moon.

I have always been interested in space and even got a telescope for Christmas last year. Only problem is I never figured out how to use it. lol Maybe I should take it out for once so my parents don't feel like I have wasted their money. I don't want them to waste it either. I would like to see them especially Mars because that is one of the planets that most interest me.

Yea, I like looking up at the sky from time to time and it certainly is a great time of the year to do so. Luckly I live away from the city so there is no lights to make it harder to see. Only thing affecting me right now is it has been cloudy lately.

The night sky is so wonderfull to look at. Its just so peacefull and also when you have a telescope you can see alot more but with the unaided eye just laying in the grass or on ur deck and lookin up at the sky is a relaxing thing i like to do but its 2 cold out right now. Once it gets a bit warmer outside i might go out and look at the sky XD

Thanks for the info. I also live in the countryside and, assuming the weather cooperates, should be able to see the planets (provided I have a good telescope of course).

I always see a larger-than-star sizes lights in the sky and always either orange or yellowish white. I thought they were some alien stuffs or nearby planets, like a few years ago where Mars can be seen with naked eye too. But to my surprise, my sister told me that if that light doesn't blink, it certainly not a star, but just a satelite. I didn't believe at first but with a little thinking and from my knowledge from my school studies (I studied Info-Comm Technology, Wireless Satelite transmission was part of my modules), I know that there are thousands of earth satelites in space transmitting our communication links and Internet. These thousand satelites are linked with one another such that they virtually creates a web-like infrastructure all around earth, wirelessly.

So to confirm if it's a planet, or an alien stuff, I suggest to use a telescope.. Definately it's sure to be fun..
Anyway I'll take down LocalSeer's notes to see if I'm on any luck...

never actually done any star watching. Me and my friend settle for cloud watching - you know how fast a cloud moves? We were watching one one night (while waiting for someone else to have a shower and all that - lying out on her driveway) and we got distracted - and when we looked back, it was gone! vanished!

Well, not really. It was just 15km away or so. But don't mess with a cloud... or it'll rain on you. Why am I talking about this?

need sleep.

Cool. The planets look wierd. Seeing them through a telescope is the coolest though.