Hi Tina, It's difficult for me to know exactly what you saw. However, I am certain that you saw one of a number of unusual optical effects caused by water droplets or ice crystals in the Earth's atmosphere. One possibility is that you saw something called an "ice halo" produced by light from the Moon scattering off of ice crystals in the upper atmosphere (http://www.atoptics.co.uk/halo/circmoon.htm). Another possibility is that you saw a corona, which can be produced by either water droplets or ice crystals (http://www.atoptics.co.uk...oplets/cormoon.htm). There is also a layer of the Sun's atmosphere called the corona, but the atmospheric effect known as a corona is completely different and has nothing to do with the Sun's corona. Sometimes scientists use the same term to describe different things. It's confusing, even for scientists sometimes! One thing rainbows, ice halos, and corona (the atmospheric kind, not the Sun's) have in common is that they are all produced by optical effects in the Earth's atmosphere related to scattering and refracting of light from the Sun or the Moon. I really like the pictures on this web site -http://www.atoptics.co.uk/. I think it is a good place to see pictures of many of the unusual phenomena in the Earth's atmosphere. Kris