Big time snoozer of a weather pattern lately – outside of that dang wind which gusted has high as 90 mph near Coal Creek Canyon this morning! Several folks in the Pikes Peak Region caught gusts as high as 50-60 mph late yesterday evening.

Responsible for the wind is the storm passing to our north at the beginning of the forecast animation. Something else that sticks out is the BIG time warm ridge that builds in. That's a classic look for widespread 50s and 60s going into the holiday weekend!

After that, a weak wave breaks south and pushing into the Four Corners region on Christmas... the passage of that system means likely snow for the mountains Christmas day... and the potential for a few Christmas afternoon flakes for the Front Range.

Below is the latest EURO ensemble look at Christmas snowfall potential:

Keep this in mind – that snow prospect for lower elevations has been trending LOWER compared to the model data we had earlier this week; so for now, we're not too jazzed just yet... In fact, even if we can drum up a little bit of moisture, it's a pretty warm storm, so it's possible we even have to handle rain showers on Christmas if moisture falls during the day... yuck.

A quick peak at EURO forecasted temps, we have a pretty reliable signal through Christmas day. Warm stuff into the weekend, a bit of a cool down Christmas with some moisture chances... and then things get a bit more chaotic and hard to predict going into the new year.

Best guess this early for a New Year's forecast is that it could be a bit more active than we've seen as the Pacific jet stream opens up a little more.

If we extend the EURO ensemble snowfall projection through the New Year, you can see that we're trying to keep the train rolling on snow chances. A map like this indicates there might be 1 or 2 chances for a light snowfall between Christmas and the first week of January. We'll see if that chance increases or decreases getting past the holiday.

For now though, get out and enjoy that nice weather over the weekend! We'll keep an eye out for any changes on the Christmas system.