Comfortable, Sunny Weather To Stick Around for Sunday

If you loved the weather we saw throughout our Saturday, you're in for a treat as Sunday's forecast is going to be pretty much a "copy & paste" of today, with only a few differences.

Because of the expansive thunderstorm activity this evening over the Upper Midwest, Sunday is going to start off with a bit more cloud cover. However, thanks to the same area of high pressure that brought the sunshine today, morning clouds will give way to more sunshine by the afternoon. High temperatures will climb back into the low 80s, which is slightly above average for this time of year. Despite a wind shift to the southeast, humidity is going to remain under control as dew points remain in the 50s. A comfortable end to the weekend before the heat & humidity ramps up for the start of the work week. On Monday, temperatures will once again climb towards the 90° mark as strong ridge of high pressure slides to the east. The air will feel slightly more humid than over the weekend, so the heat index may be a couple degrees above the air temperature.

Tuesday is going to be the day to watch, as it will be our next chance to see heavy rain potential. And we can all thank what is now Tropical Storm Cristobal for that. The latest update from the National Hurricane Center places Cristobal right in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico, with sustained winds of 50 mph. Cristobal is expected to make landfall along the Gulf coast by Monday morning, and then make a bee-line for the Midwest and the Stateline by Tuesday. Fortunately, we will only be dealing with the remnant low of this tropical cyclone, but along with it will be plenty of tropical moisture.

Models this evening continued to keep the brunt of the rainfall associated with Cristobal's remnants to the west and northwest of the region, bringing soaking rain to portions of Iowa, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. As much as 3"- 4" of soaking rain could fall in those areas from Tuesday morning into Wednesday afternoon. For the Stateline, it all comes down to the track of the remnant low. If models pick up on a slightly eastward shift in the track, our region could pick up more rainfall than current models suggest. A shift to the west results in less rainfall. But overall, current thinking is that most locations around the Stateline could receive at least 1" of rainfall. Something to keep an eye on over the next 24-48 hours.