Getting hotter, but still searching for rain in a summer pattern

Summer (officially) is about to get started, so you're not surprised that we're talking about heat. The solstice happens June 21st at 9:57AM, when the sun is directly overhead at the Tropic of Cancer (or about 23° latitude). This area of the country gets nearly 15 hours of daylight, and then of course, daylight decreases until the winter solstice. 

Texas has been getting smothered in extremely hot weather. Look at the forecast for Tuesday and Wednesday:

We continue to be on the northern edge of that really intense heat, and it's not coming up here in the near future. What will be of interest is yet another California or West coast system that comes across the northern Rockies late in the week/weekend. It's going to drive a front across the Plains Saturday night. While it won't necessarily cool things off much, it keeps our temperatures in check and we'll see more seasonal late June weather over the weekend and early next week.

Our concern is that even though we have been able to keep the hotter weather suppressed to the southern Plains, that may be changing at the end of the month. Here's the outlook for late June and early July - the yellows and oranges all represent above average temperatures. The average highs in late June are low 90s, so if we end up even slightly warmer than that, it's going to be hot:

While dry weather might be to some advantage for wheat harvest, we certainly don't want the rains to stop like they did last July. You might recall that after the 4th of July holiday, everybody went dry and we couldn't buy a round of storms for the Plains. I recently shared some images showcasing what I thought would be near "average" rainfall for July and I still think that'll be the case. Here's a snapshot of the first 8 days in July (this is forecast rainfall) - not overly impressive, but the alternative is no rain at all.

And here's a look at July 8-15th - opportunity for rainfall might increase a bit after the 4th of July holiday. 

Bottom line - prepare for hotter weather (it's that time of year) and our chances for rain might be on hold for many areas until after the 4th. I still don't see this summer being as dry as last year. And I doubt it will be as hot either. 

Have a great day.