Temperatures reached up to 82° officially on Tuesday. It marks the first time the mercury has reached 80° since back on October 21st of last year! That's a full 199 day span between 80s, so if you're like me and you think that it's been awhile, you're not kidding yourself....it has been a long, long time. Normally, we see our first 80° temperatures in the April 23-26th neighborhood, so we're a good week and a half or so off the pace. 

It might be a little too early to think about going to the beach, or even swimming in the pool, but how did you enjoy the gorgeous day Tuesday? And looking ahead, what are you most looking forward to doing once summer arrives?

We were able to get up into the low and mid 80s Tuesday thanks to an abundance of sunshine, which continues to grow stronger by the day. Not only are the days longer now, but the sun angle is higher, meaning the sun's rays are shining more directly on the Earth's surface, allowing us to warm up a little bit more at a time!

Unfortunately, this spell of warmth is a brief one, and seasonable to below normal temperatures are about to return with the arrival of a cold front Wednesday. 

This front will be the triggering mechanism for showers and thunderstorms throughout the day on Wednesday, especially in the first half of the day. As the front continues to move away to the South and East of Rockford, the threat for showers and t-storms will begin to decrease in the afternoon.  Then, you see that big blue H in the graphic above? Yeah, that thing hanging out in Minnesota? That's high pressure, which will slide in for Thursday and Friday. And while that does bring cooler air into the region, it will at least mean that the sun should be back out for the tail end of the workweek!

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