Skies have begun to clear from northwest to southeast across the state today.  As of this writing, the back edge of the cloud shelf is stretched diagonally across the state from around Texarkana down to Del Rio.  By tomorrow, most of the state will be welcoming the sunny skies once again…and it’s expected to hang around into the coming weekend with the overall weather pattern expected to stay quiet and uneventful.  If you’ve put off getting the holiday decorations hung outdoors, this coming weekend looks like the perfect opportunity!

A weak-ish cold front is moving through the panhandle this evening, and through the rest of the state tomorrow.  It will not do much more than just provide a reinforcing shot of cool continental air to keep us at or slightly below normal temperature-wise for the next few days.  No rain is expected with the passage of this front.  In fact, it looks like we’ll remain dry across the entire state until we get into the middle of next week when it looks like we’ll begin to see our next weather pattern change with rain returning to the forecast.

Lows tonight will drop into the 20s across the panhandle, 30s for north and west central Texas, with 40s and 50s across south central and coastal areas.  Highs tomorrow, a little warmer with highs in the low 50s across the panhandle, mid 50s across north central and northeast Texas, and some very pleasant readings in the mid 60s across central and south Texas.  All in all, not bad at all!

Now that we’re getting into the Winter months, lots of folks have been asking what the weather will will be like with El Nino conditions now present and looking quite strong.  Below is the latest temperature and precipitation outlooks for the months of December, January and February.  The trends are still holding for a wetter than average and cooler than average winter season for much of Texas.  There is no way to predict if snowfall or ice will be more abundant this winter because there are many conditions other than just an El Nino pattern which will determine snowfall.  As we saw this last weekend, we already had one significant winter event in the form of a crippling ice storm which impacted parts of the panhandle and western Oklahoma.  It’s certainly not out of the question that we could see more of that if temps stay on the cool side and we continue to see abundant moisture to create precipitation, but no one can say with any real certainty that it will happen.  At any rate, it does look like Texas will be fully out of drought shortly if we do see above average rainfall, and that will certainly be welcomed for our lakes, livestock and crops as we head into the new year!