As seen at the North Elba Show Grounds in Lake Placid, the moon starts to cover the sun on Monday, April 8. (News photo — Parker O'Brien)

My dad said to me on the morning of Monday, April 8, “This is probably a once-in-a-lifetime chance to experience a solar eclipse.” I had never experienced any type of eclipse before, so I was pretty curious about what was about to happen.

As the eclipse approached, my mother and father recalled seeing a partial eclipse when they were in elementary school.

As the morning of April 8 went on, there was a lot to do to get ready for the eclipse. My family and I have a large yard next to our house. We decided to set up an area to watch near the end of our side yard, with a picnic table, comfortable chairs, snacks and lots of eclipse glasses. The area my family chose was in the shade of two giant cedar trees, that the little kids could climb on while they waited for the eclipse to start, and was near the widest part of our yard where we could see the sun the best. It was our own eclipse watch party, with our big family.

We all went outside to check out the sky. As I put on my eclipse glasses, I was awed at the color of the sun through my glasses. It was a raw orange, and it looked like someone had taken a cookie bite out of it, against the pitch-black sky.

As the eclipse went on, the sun grew smaller and smaller. I noticed the air began to grow very cold, so I ran into the house to grab my jacket. From my perch on top of the red picnic table, with my eclipse glasses on, I saw the sun start to disappear in the time frame of about 5 seconds.

The solar eclipse reaches totality as the moon completely blots out the sun. (News photo — Parker O'Brien)

“It’s happening!” I shouted. “Put on your glasses and look!”

Everyone listened and put their glasses on. Right as my brother put on his glasses, the sun became a tiny dot in the sky, and everything looked black.

“Quick!” my mom said. “Take off your glasses and look around!”

We all did, and to my amazement, it looked like it was the middle of the night and the sky was dark black. I even saw some stars on the horizon. My siblings were all amazed, and everyone was speechless for a few seconds. Then my younger brother started screaming. Soon, all my siblings were dancing around happily and screaming with joy. As they were celebrating, one of the people staying in our neighbor’s house yelled at us from across the field. Oops.

After a few seconds of me just being in awe, I realized something.

“I’ve got to get a picture!” I said.

I ran back to our watch area and grabbed my camera. It was dead.

“Aw, man,” I thought.

So I ran and went to grab my parents’ camera, and as soon as I turned it on, the sky instantly brightened.

“Hurry, hurry, hurry!” my Dad said. “Quick, get your glasses on!”

I guess I was too late because I just missed my only opportunity to get a picture of the sun and moon in totality. Oh well. I will still remember this moment forever. I ran to my seat and grabbed my glasses, and I hastily shoved them on my face. As I looked up at the sky, I discovered that the sun was coming out again and it looked just like it did before totality. It began to get bigger and brighter as it started to take its shape of a bright, orange circle hanging in the dark, black sky.

The solar eclipse this year was incredibly amazing and must of been one of the coolest experiences in my whole life. I still am in awe and just speechless of this amazing act that nature can put on.