Temperatures warm up a bit through weekend

Cloudy skies are expected Thursday in the metro-east as a slow warming trend begins that will get temperatures closer to normal by the weekend.

The high will be 31 Thursday, seven degrees cooler than the average high for Jan. 21 in the St. Louis metropolitan area, according to the National Weather Service. But that’s three degrees warmer than the high of 28 Wednesday and six degrees warmer than the high of 25 Tuesday.

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The period of Jan. 6-19 is historically the coldest time of year in the St. Louis area with average high temperatures of 37.

But the averages start to climb in the last third of the month. The historic high from Jan. 20-25 is 38, from Jan. 26-29 it’s 39 and by Jan. 30 the average high is 40.

The low Thursday night will drop to 21 under cloudy skies.

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On Friday the high will again be 31 with clouds. Friday night, the low will be 21 as cloud cover begins to break up.

The weekend calls for the sun to make an appearance with a high of 35. Overnight,the low will be 19 and skies will be partly cloudy.

The high will be 43 Sunday under partly sunny skies. Clouds and a low of 30 are expected Sunday night.

Click here for the detailed local forecast.

This story was originally published January 21, 2016 at 6:32 AM with the headline "Temperatures warm up a bit through weekend."