Maine is vacationland and many folks live and visit for our great summer weather. While this morning is quite nice, we do have more storms for later today.   Over the next week to 10 days I think it will be important to take advantage of the morning as the chance for rain will increase in the afternoon.  

I’ll be updating the details of the July 4th forecast on Twitter at @growingwisdom Please follow me there. Feel free to comment or ask questions too.
 
Living here in Maine  many of us wait all year for the warm weather, when we get stuck in these patterns of high humidity with scattered showers it can certainly put a damper on our collective moods.
 
I want to stress that the upcoming period of weather will have days that are really great. We might not have any showers between 5 AM and 3 PM only to have the skies open up around 5 PM.  
For some areas of interior York and Cumberland counties a heat wave will become official today as temperatures hit 90F for the third day in a row.  Coastal areas, including Portland will stay just shy of 90F this afternoon.  A rather steady breeze will bring some relief from the heat and as clouds increase prior to any showers temperatures can fall back a few degrees.
 
Like yesterday, not everyone will see showers and thunderstorms, but we are all at risk for them. If you do experience a storm this afternoon there will be heavy rain, possible hail and gusty winds.  Of course lightning is also always a concern during thunderstorms.
 
Wednesday will be another warm and humid day with that chance of storms again for the afternoon.   As the storms cross the area heavy rain and street flooding can occur.  Getting caught in one of these storms won’t be fun, so have back-up plans ready to go.  Camp begins for the kids this week and they will need some extra shoes and socks as I suspect they will get quite wet in this weather regime.  I don’t think we will 90F degree readings in the area, but it will still feel warm.
 
Thursday brings more of the same but temperatures will be even cooler only reaching the lower 70s.  It will feel rather monsoonal and showers and storms will erupt in the afternoon. There can be one or two inches of rain in a short period of time.  Some areas could see over 6 inches of rain between now and the 4th of July.  The mosquitoes are going to be even worse than they are already.  I’m depressed just blogging this!
 
This pattern is courtesy of what meteorologists call a trough in the upper pattern.  Troughs are dips in the jet stream that allow warm moist air and cooler drier air to mix along the path of the trough.  This type of flow can leave areas on the moist side with a lot of rain (snow in the winter).  In many ways our winter pattern hasn’t really broken down yet.  What we are continually seeing are areas of moisture riding along the jet stream and kicking off afternoon and evening storminess.
 
You are probably wondering when this pattern will change and we will see fewer days with rain.  Both of the major models we use for medium and longer range forecasting keep this type of weather around through the 4th of July.  Since that is 10 days away, I can’t go out any further, but feel reasonable confident we aren’t seeing a week of dry days any time soon.
 

Gardening this week How are the plantings looking that you have against the foundation of your dwelling? Are they overgrown, too small or crowded? Check out this video in which I show you one foundation planting from start to finish. I added several important tips throughout the video.

I’ll be updating the details of the July 4th forecast on Twitter at @growingwisdom Please follow me there. Feel free to comment or ask questions too.

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