Winter Solstice Quotes 2016: 10 Sayings About Snow And The Season To Share On Facebook, Instagram, Twitter

Winter solstice will occur Wednesday, marking the shortest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere. On this day, the North Pole is tilted farthest from the sun — about 23.5 degrees.

The exact moment falls this year at 5.44 a.m. EST, Dec. 21, also marking the start of astronomical winter.

Here are a few of our favorite quotes for winter collected from GoodReads and the Quote Garden:

• “Winter is the time for comfort, for good food and warmth, for the touch of a friendly hand and for a talk beside the fire: it is the time for home.” ― Edith Sitwell
• “I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields, that it kisses them so gently? And then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt; and perhaps it says, "Go to sleep, darlings, till the summer comes again.” ― Lewis Carroll.
• "I heard a bird sing/ In the dark of December/ A magical thing/ And sweet to remember:/ 'We are nearer to spring/ Than we were in September.'"― Oliver Herford
• “What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness.” ― John Steinbeck
• "At the Summer Solstice, all is green and growing, potential coming into being, the miracle of manifestation painted large on the canvas of awareness. At the Winter Solstice, the wind is cold, trees are bare and all lies in stillness beneath blankets of snow." ― Gary Zukav
• “Snow flurries began to fall and they swirled around people's legs like house cats. It was magical, this snow globe world.” ― Sarah Addison Allen, The Sugar Queen
• "Snow was falling/ so much like stars/ filling the dark trees/ that one could easily imagine/ its reason for/ being was nothing more/ than prettiness.” ― Mary Oliver
• “Thank goodness for the first snow, it was a reminder ― no matter how old you became and how much you'd seen, things could still be new if you were willing to believe they still mattered.” ― Candace Bushnell
• "There is a privacy about it which no other season gives you. In spring, summer and fall people sort of have an open season on each other; only in the winter, in the country, can you have longer, quiet stretches when you can savor belonging to yourself." ― Ruth Stout
• “December, being the last month of the year, cannot help but make us think of what is to come.” ― Fennel Hudson