It was a dreary but relatively mild day in the Stateline Monday. We saw a few brief rain showers early in the afternoon, while some in Wisconsin saw accumulating snowfall. Our snowfall has begun the melting process, encouraged by afternoon highs in the upper 30s for most.
The Rockford airport is showing a drop in the snow depth. Fresh snow late last week brought it back to 2", but that has since been dropping through the weekend. We need to maintain 1" of snow depth through Christmas morning for it to officially be a White Christmas. Rockford's last 2 White Christmases were in 2017 and 2022. This Christmas appears unlikely to have much snow on the ground aside from a few soggy snow piles. Temperatures the next few days will reach the mid to upper 30s for highs and only drop near 30° overnight.
Christmas Day will feature continued thick cloud cover, with chances of light rain showers or drizzle, especially during the second half of the day. Afternoon highs will reach the mid to upper 30s once again.
The pattern becomes milder but wetter toward the end of the week as periodic drizzle morphs into waves of steady rain showers starting Thursday evening into Friday. The highest chance for this looks to be between Friday and Sunday. That will be paired with afternoon highs well into the 40s and even near 50° at times through the weekend!
But the pattern is set to flip on its head into the first two weeks of January. Computer models have been suggesting a return to a cold pattern sometime in January. Long-range outlooks from the Climate Prediction Center back this up, indicating a 50-60% chance of seeing below average temperatures between the 4th-17th of January. Average highs for that time of year are in the upper 20s to near 30°.
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