Iowa Weather Report December 9th 2014: Warming Bells Warming All The Way

A WARM UP: The weather will be mainly sunny with some clouds from time to time through the end of the week. Temperatures will be slowly warming through the week as well with highs today in the 30s and lower 40s, rising into the 40s and 50s by the end of the week. This will melt any leftover snow that is still on the ground, especially in sheltered areas.

WEEKEND STORM: The next system will move into the state this weekend with the best chance of seeing any precipitation being on Sunday through early Tuesday morning of next week. Saturday will be the better of the two days this weekend with a notable increase in clouds and readings still running in the 40s and 50s across the state. We can’t rule out an isolated shower on Saturday over the western counties, but the chances look better as we head into Sunday. Amounts look to be light through Sunday afternoon before some heavier precipitation moves in for Sunday night and the day on Monday. At this time, the precipitation looks to be in the form of rain, however during the overnight hours, we can’t rule out a changeover to the wintry mix, especially in the northwestern counties of the state. We should see a gradual changeover Monday evening through early Tuesday morning to some snow. This doesn’t look like it will bring a large amount of snow, but it may cover the ground especially in the northern and northeastern counties of the state. We will be able to fine tune this as we get closer to the weekend and early next week.

BEGINNING TO GET CLOSE TO CHRISTMAS: As we look toward Christmas, the weather pattern looks a bit different. Gone are the warmer than average temperatures, replaced with more typical readings of mid to late December. This model run is also showing some possible snow chances that could give us a white Christmas for many of us. However the timing of these is bound to change as we move forward, but the chances do look promising at this time. As we get closer to Christmas, temperatures look to trend downward below seasonal levels, similar to what we had in November. Again this too is up in the air and something we will have to watch in the coming days.