Thaw for the upcoming week is basically off the table but snow appears fairly minimal right now

The weakened push of balmy weather isn't going to do much to the several inches of white concrete encasing my yard. The best solution would be to top it with about 30 inches of powder but we're going to have to wait on that for now. Some mixed precipitation will pass through the region Saturday night as expected and the high elevations could see 1-2 inches while it remains mostly wet down low. Temperatures will hover at or just above the freezing mark (depending on your elevation) under a mostly cloudy sky on Sunday.

The fast moving jet stream will amplify Monday into Tuesday. There will be a sizable storm that will remain off the coast and a clipper system that will get ingested into this system late Monday into Tuesday. This process will create the inverted trough setup that was discussed a few days ago with a possible deformation area of snow late on Monday into Tuesday. Most of the available data is suggesting that the bulk of this occurs south and west of the Green Mountains though models traditionally struggle miserably trying to pinpoint these areas outside of a day or two in advance. Our most likely outcome right now is a period of very light snow late on Monday, Monday night or early Tuesday with minimal accumulation with a slight chance for more. Don't hold your breath on this storm though. Not worth it.

The week as a whole continues to appear colder with each passing day. The potential late-week thaw that the various long range ensembles were advertising as "destructive" a week ago is basically gone. Temperatures will hover in the teens on Tuesday, might get back below zero on Wednesday and will very much struggle to reach the freezing mark, if at all, late in the week. That's fantastic news, but we need some snow to go along with that and models are a bit more bearish on that front early this weekend. A relatively weak storm system is expected to get guided out of the southern Rockies later in the week as arctic air makes another southward advance. It's possible this storm evolves into an anafrontal type wave of low pressure but where does it hit or will it fall apart entirely ? I'll seek to answer this question within a day or two but at least we have a "snow or no" situation as opposed to a "how bad will this thaw be". At the very least, the arctic boundary should provide a light accumulation before readings get sent back into the teens and single numbers for the first weekend in February.

Much of the themes discussed a few days ago hold true as far as our outlook for February is concerned. The combination of the falling EPO index (death of the evil empire) and the establishment of a large block in the jet stream north of the Bering Sea will allow arctic cold to cover a good part of Canada and much of the northern tier of the United States. At the same time and in very typical La Nina - like fashion, a ridge across the southeastern states will try and keep the arctic air from penetrating southward to the extent that it did around the holidays and in early January. The result should be some Game of Thrones level excitement. The Lannister army trying to bring their warm weather northward. John Snow (Should I say Targarian ? ) keeping us protected with cold and hopefully some snow. The White Walkers ? I don't think we really want them around.