Mild, windy and wet are the weather words for Christmas Eve and Christmas morning before drier air takes hold later tomorrow.

A large storm in the Great Lakes region is pulling up warm and moist air from the southern regions of the country. This flow will continue overnight and into early tomorrow.

Rain will continue to overspread the region into the evening hours and become steadier and heavier. The radar loop below shows how the rain will move through tomorrow morning.

Notice one batch overnight then a break before the final round of showers in the morning Christmas. The break likely occurs around 3 AM with the final push of rain between 7AM and 10AM tomorrow.

Rainfall totals will generally be in the 1 to 2 inch range. This isn’t enough for more than some street flooding. I am not expecting a major issue from the freshwater.

Along the coast there is a coastal flood advisory for some splash over during the time of high tide and also some minor beach erosion. There will also be strong winds, along the coast which could create very widely scattered power issues, but again these would be the exception not the rule.

The strongest winds will occur on Christmas Day as drier air moves into the region.

Temperatures will rise throughout the night and top out near record highs tomorrow in the upper 50s to near 60F. The record high in Portland is 57F set back in 1888 with the modern day record 53 set in 1994. and I think we will break the 1994 record and come close the 19th century warmth as well.

Sunshine should make an appearance later tomorrow afternoon and this will set up a very nice pair of days for Friday and Saturday. If you get new golf clubs for Christmas and you can find an open course, it would be rather fun to be trying them out on the final days of December.

Colder weather is on the horizon. By the time we get to New Year’s Eve highs will only be in the low to mid 30s, but I still don’t see any big snow on the horizon just yet. Have a great Christmas holiday.