What's your weather like right now?

[Laura_in_FL]

Speaking of that, this storm brought and will bring tornadoes, damaging winds, and other nastiness all over the Southeast today. So I'd appreciate it if all y'all Southerners would kindly check in and let us know you're all right.

[paulf]

Eight inches of snow, an hour and a half to snow-blow the driveway, temps dropping into single digits. No tornadoes, just blowing white stuff. Another day inside.

[pepperhead212]

Just a lot of rain here, the heavier to come later - 7 to 11 pm worst. 50° now, but it's supposed to get to 59° around midnight. Around 3 or 4 am it's supposed to stop raining.

Update - I thought I was hearing the thunder they are forecasting, but not yet - it was neighbor's trash cans blowing around! I am lucky I went out early this morning, before it rained much, and brought mine back, and put some bricks in them - something I do whenever they are predicting bad winds. The rain has let up, around 5:30, but that's just a brief lull, and the worst is around 10 pm, when a long squall line is shown in the radar, which might be bringing down some trees - they're worried about the ground being so soaked from these previous rains, that the roots are not holding them well. They are warning about possible widespread power outages, for this reason.

I hope everyone is OK out there, in the snow and rain areas!

OK - at 6:12 the thunder is starting! A thunderstorm in January!

[Laura_in_FL]

Wow, there was more damage scattered around the county from yesterday's tornado than I knew about yesterday morning. About 100 people are displaced in my county alone, because their homes or apartments are too damaged to live in. And there's more in other counties, and throughout the Southeast from other tornadoes.

But in my county here we are fortunate that no one died or is missing, and although some are hospitalized with injuries, none are life-threatening.

Some of the folks who lost their homes yesterday also lost them during Hurricane Michael five years ago. Watching them get interviewed for the local news, you can see resigned exhaustion in their eyes - they know exactly what they are in for, and I really feel for them. But hopefully since it's scattered damage and not widespread damage, maybe they can get their insurance claims processed and the repair work done much faster this time.

Today is cool and sunny. More rain (and possibly storms) are expected Friday, and then more rain again on Monday. My forecast for next Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday nights gets colder every time I look at it, and different sources have widely varying estimates of how cold it will get. Depending on who you believe, Monday night might be a frost and Tuesday night might be a hard freeze.

[Laura_in_FL]

I know people in other parts of the country are getting real cold. Brrr!!!

But next week it looks like we're getting cold, too. At least cold by Florida standards. Currently the forecast for Tuesday night is 23F actual temp, wind chill 14F. And that forecast seems to get colder every time I look at it! So we're skipping light frosts and going straight to a hard freeze this winter. Hopefully the cool weather and near-frosts we've had recently have been enough to put the fruit trees into full dormancy so they don't get damaged.

Since I lost all of my citrus except my kumquats when temps dropped to the teens just over a year ago, at least I don't have to worry about whether my citrus trees will survive.

[pepperhead212]

We had a nice day today - 50° while I was out there today, with sun finally, and almost no wind! I was just cleaning up branches, from that storm, and another storm forecast for late tomorrow. Earlier next week, it is getting colder, with one day only forecast to get to 29° for a high! Definitely well below average, for this date.

[paulf]

Five degrees in Brookings, SD mid afternoon. Overnight here the on to Fargo and below zero, but no more snow. We left home early to miss the next blizzard.

[Laura_in_FL]

We're expecting a line of storms to roll through about lunchtime. Hopefully it will be less wild than earlier this week!

After no real frosts so far this fall and winter, we have frosts or freezes forecast for 5 of the next 10 days, including two hard freezes. Winter took its time getting started, but it's definitely not skipping us this year.

[pepperhead212]

It's 55° here now (10:30 pm), and raining. It's supposed to get warmer overnight, then start getting cooler about when it starts getting light out. It's supposed to stop raining early, too, but we'll see...

[octave1]

0º and sunny here, and it looks like it will be in the single digit all day today, tomorrow and every night next week.

[Laura_in_FL]

Brrr, octave1! Stay warm!

[pepperhead212]

I had a snow squall line go through about 12:45 pm, and the wind was blowing it horizontally! It only lasted 30 minutes, and there wasn't even a coating. The temperature had dropped to 31°, but is supposed to get up to 36° later, and that is about the warmest it will be all week.

[paulf]

We were able to leave Fargo this afternoon after granddaughter’s hockey game and made it all the way to Sioux Falls. Clear roads so far. Next is into Iowa and then home. Only four hours to go. Southern Nebraska temps have been ten degrees colder than North Dakota…hope the pipes did not freeze.

[pepperhead212]

Stay safe, paulf! I hope everyone and everything is ok, when you get home.

It started snowing about 2:30 pm, and it has barely accumulated in 3 hours, mostly on the cars. Supposed to snow well into the morning - time will tell how much, but it's not supposed to get too deep around here, but I'll find out tomorrow if it switched to rain.

[paulf]

Thanks for the good wishes. The drive was easy and while a cold water faucet in the kitchen frozen, the hot is running and every other line is OK. The foot of snow was light and powdery and only took an hour to clear the driveway. Forty below wind chill tonight and then abating in a couple of days.

[pepperhead212]

Update - as of 11:30, I am officially no longer in a snow draught! It had snowed just over an inch, though it might switch over to sleet or rain, later on. It finally started accumulating on my walks, and it's up to about half an inch there. First time for "measurable snow" in 715 days.

[Laura_in_FL]

Hard freeze tonight, the first of the winter. Low of 24F expected, with around 12 hours below freezing. Since I've had many near-but-not-quite frosts since November, it looks like I am skipping frost and going straight to hard freeze this winter. Wind chill will be around 15F, maybe a bit colder.

I know that's not remotely as cold as what most of you are dealing with, but by Florida standards it is cold. And it's not looking like the last freeze of the year, either, since we are expecting frost tomorrow night, then another freeze Friday night and another hard freeze Saturday night.

This afternoon I'll be covering and bringing in plants (the plants I want to bring in are already loaded onto the garden cart so we just have to roll them into the garage later), dripping outside faucets, and running the pool pump overnight - the usual cold weather drill. Oh, and we already took off all of the irrigation timers and made sure all of the irrigation lines are dry.

Since any sort of frozen/freezing precipitation anywhere in Florida is newsworthy, I'll mention that over in far western Florida (Pensacola and Milton for sure; maybe as far east as Crestview), they had a bit of freezing rain this morning. We had only rain here, of course.

[daylilydude]

Well this is the most snow I have seen since moving here 29 years ago. There is about 8" of it and the MDOT wants us to stay off the roads unless an emergency! They called off school for today and tomorrow and i'm thinking they may call it off for Thursday also. These are some really cold temps as we had 3 degrees last night and they are forecasting 1 degree tonight, so this snow is not going anywhere soon as here where we live they are not set up for this kind of snow... no snow plows here lol! Well y'all stay safe and warm.

[paulf]

We get that weather about once or twice a year...and I still hate it. Stay home and stay safe.

[pepperhead212]

I only had about 1½" of snow, but it changed to freezing rain, and a freezing layer formed on my snow, on the walks and my car, which made it harder to remove. It was still coming down when I started getting it off, and it was still sleeting a little when I finished. I salted everything, and came inside, after just 35 minutes, but seemed like much longer. Tomorrow is supposed to get much colder, and very windy, and I hopefully won't be going outside to do anymore of this.

[rdback]

It was sunny and 10F this morning, on its way to 28F. It's snowed 2-3" twice over the last four days, so there's 5-6" of snow out there. No above-freezing temps forecast for the next several days, so the snow will be around a while. I don't bother moving snow that's less than 6-8". I just throw 'er in 4-wheel drive and off we go, lol. I hear there's a chance for more snow on Fri/Sat I think. That's ok, we've got plenty of food and no plans to go anywhere anytime soon. Homemade chili and cornbread tonight!

[Laura_in_FL]

23F for the low this morning, heading for low 40s this afternoon. We should pass the freezing mark here shortly, so I can go outside and turn off the dripping faucets.

We had no snow or ice, which is a good thing because we Floridians lose our fool minds on the very rare occasions when that happens. Speaking of foolishness, one of the local elementary schools had an emergency closure today due to frozen pipes.

The county government is running warming centers/emergency shelters set up for elderly or other folks whose houses don't have adequate heating. They are pretty spartan, but offer hot meals and a warm place to sleep. We have more need for shelters than usual because 172 homes were damaged or destroyed by last week's tornado. It's pretty darn hard to keep your house warm when some or all of the roof has been ripped off.

[pepperhead212]

It got to about 35° here today, maybe one more degree by the time it starts going down. I went out maybe for 10 minutes, brushed the last of the ice off my car, so it will be clear, once the snow starts coming down again! Only supposed to get down to 30°, but that's about it, and the snow is supposed to stay as snow, not freezing rain, then a frozen sheet on it, like the last storm. But, they've been wrong before...

[paulf]

Snowing again, about an inch additional; just in time to make a travel to Iowa City to watch another granddaughter, this time volleyball. Also the Christmas gathering with the IC family. Hope by morning the roads are drivable.

[pepperhead212]

As of 10 am, I have gotten about 1½" of snow, with 3-6" forecast. Fortunately, just below freezing, so won't be too bad when I go out and clean it up. And I'll have to do this today, as it is getting much colder overnight, and staying that way, with single digit wind chills, so I'll be finishing this in the dark!

[Laura_in_FL]

Cloudy and in the upper 50s now. Our high for the day was 63F at dawn, since a cold front is pushing through. We are expecting a frost tonight and a freeze tomorrow, then it is expected to warm up.

Next week is forecast to be gloomy, rainy, and warm all week due to southerly winds bringing in warm moist air from the Gulf. The forecast is for highs in the low 70s, lows around 60, and 3.5"-4" of rain spread out from Tuesday - Saturday. Then it will probably get colder again - it's too early for winter to be over yet down here.

[pepperhead212]

It's slowed down enough that I went out to clear the snow around 3:50 pm, and had it done in less than an hour. There was over 4", but it wasn't freezing up, like it did last time, so it cleared quickly. Originally, it wasn't supposed to be stopping until around 10 pm (!), and I would have been out there close to that, but when I went out, they had moved that back to 6 pm, and it had almost stopped, when I finished, going over the walks one last time, then putting the salt down, one last time. I re-filled the bucket with calcium chloride, and I still hadn't spent an hour out there. It's still 31°, but the high tomorrow is supposed to get to just 25°, with bad wind chills. I won't be going out there tomorrow, barring any emergency!

Update - it started snowing lightly again, lightly coating my car, but it finally stopped around 6:30, so I went out and brushed it off - the walks stayed just wet, from the salt. If I had left it there, it would have been a frozen sheet tomorrow.

[september]

It was -22 F below 0 this morning at our house, coldest yet this year. -27F at the airport. Good news is we are already on a warming trend. In past years we expected this for a week or two in a row, so one night is nothing to moan about.

[pepperhead212]

Only got to 25° today, even in the bright sun, yet it has still only gotten to 24° at 10 pm! Getting a little warmer tomorrow, but not above freezing until Monday, though Sunday night is forecast to be our coldest of the season.

[Laura_in_FL]

We have one more cold day today (high of 49) and cold night tonight (low 34) but tonight will still be warmer than the last two nights. I am about to take my cart of semi-tender plants out of the garage and back outside. (Semi-tender meaning they can handle frosts but are iffy in hard freezes.) Those plants are going to stay on the cart, though, since more hard freezes are probable between now and mid-February.

Beginning tomorrow is a warming trend. Gloomy skies are forecast all week, with rain starting Tuesday and not ending until Sunday morning. Highs will be around 70 and lows mostly around 60 (day/night temperature swings will be 10 degrees or less because of the heavy cloud cover).

Hopefully the following week will bring at least a couple of mild and sunny days - I can always hope!