Chilly mornings and sunny, seasonable afternoons will keep the Garden State's weather forecast quite pleasant by mid-October standards.

A cold front brought rain showers to northern and central New Jersey on Thursday afternoon. The highest total? A whopping 0.07" in Ramsey (Bergen Co.) Over 55% of the state remains in Moderate Drought, according to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor. 3% of Jersey - encompassing Bergen County - is now in Severe Drought.

The more important impacts of that front will be felt on Friday: cooler, drier air. Dew points plummeting into the 30s will cause a cool morning and evening, and will keep skies bright and sunny throughout the day. Highs should range from about 60 to 66 degrees. Normal for mid-October would be around 66 degrees, so we'll be close.

Skies across most of New Jersey Friday night will be mostly clear. The exception, according to the latest forecast models, will be some cloud cover over South Jersey. That's actually an important difference - any clouds overhead will act as a "blanket," keeping some of the day's warmth close to the surface. Where skies are clear, temperatures will probably fall into the upper 30s to lower 40s overnight. In the coldest spots - the higher elevations around and north of I-80, and the middle of the Pine Barrens - patchy frost is likely as temperatures dip into the mid 30s.

We'll keep the beautiful sunshine on Saturday. High temperatures are expected to reach the seasonable mid 60s. Probably a long-sleeve and/or light jacket autumn day.

Sunday will bring increasing clouds, but our forecast still looks very nice during the daytime hours. Highs will rise to the upper 60s to around 70 degrees.

By Sunday evening, a storm system looks to clip northern New Jersey. That will continue to thicken clouds, and may drop some showers over the Garden State. Similar to Thursday, any rainfall will be limited in geography and intensity - less than a tenth of an inch, at most.

Showers may linger into Monday morning. But the rest of the forecast for early next week looks great. Skies will become partly sunny by Monday afternoon, with a warming trend kicking into high gear. Monday's high temperatures are forecast to reach the lower to mid 70s - about 10 degrees above normal for this time of year.

And the warmup doesn't stop there. Models push temperatures close to 80 degrees for Tuesday and Wednesday!

Have a great weekend!

Dan Zarrow is Chief Meteorologist for Townsquare Media New Jersey. Follow him on Facebook or Twitter for the latest forecast and realtime weather updates.

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