Chicago Weather: Warm Start To Winter Continues, Christmas May Be Warmest In 37 Years

CHICAGO (CBS) -- The warm start to winter continued Monday – and the forecast continues to nudge just a bit higher.

On Monday night, skies will be partly cloudy as the low drops to 31.

On Christmas Eve Tuesday, it will be mostly sunny and mild with a high of 53. The low for Tuesday night is 37.

And the Christmas forecast has warmed up just a little bit more – with a forecast high now of 54. That would make it the warmest Christmas in 37 years.

It would also tie for the fifth warmest ever. Here are the warmest temperatures recorded on Christmas Day going back as far as records go.

As we pointed out on Sunday, Christmas 1982 was the warmest in Chicago history – with a high of 64 degrees that brought windsurfers out onto Lake Michigan. But the following year, it was the polar opposite – pun intended – as the low dropped to 17 degrees below zero and the high was only -5.

On Christmas Day this year, our morning low may also rank among the warmest. The Christmas morning temperature is expected to be 37 degrees, which would be the fourth warmest low temperature on Christmas Day.

The warmest is 46 degrees in 1936.

While we likely won't break records on Christmas, the day after may be close.

The record high for Dec. 26 is 55 degrees. Our forecast? 55 degrees.

Highs do not drop back to the 30s until Sunday.