SPRINTER CONTINUES...

It's the magical time of year - a transition between seasons... known as Sprinter (not really, but let's play along here). Meteorological spring began back on March first, the spring equinox is this coming Thursday. However, it's never a switch that flips... as evidence by last weekend's 70s and this weekend's snow. Temperatures recently have been running more springlike in general to start the month of March.

Temperatures as a whole across the Upper Midwest have been running above normal (around ~3 to 10 degrees above normal) for the first half of March.

Cooler air moved into place this weekend and temperatures were running below normal. And that may be the case over the next week or so, generally cooler temperatures. That will be the case Monday afternoon, with temperatures pretty close to normal:

The first half of the week will be dry, but with systems coming through we will have ups and downs in the temperatures. There will be some warm days tossed in the mix, but generally near/below normal temperatures are expected.

Check out the temperatures on the European model for Cedar Rapids and the Quad Cities:

The warmth builds and then a series of systems will start to knock temperatures back down. The first system comes in on Wednesday into Thursday.

Then another Thursday into Friday:

It's too early to get into the details of these systems but they both will bring the chance for snow to parts of the Midwest. We'll be able to determine where and how much over the coming days. The good news is that snow in March doesn't tend to stick around long..

RK