Southern Alberta has enjoyed another wave of warmth following a bitter cold snap, but it won't last much longer.

This week's temperatures have flown well above the end-of-January average of -3 degrees Celsius.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, High River broke previous heat records of 14° set in 1992, with highs of 14.4° and 14.3°.

Environment and Climate Change Canada meteorologist Samantha Mauti says the upper ridge that has kept us warm this week is about to fade away.

"We have a cold front swinging through, bringing the possibility of precipitation starting as rain and changing to snow as that cold front swings through, and bringing the temperatures closer to normal for the end of the week and into early next week."

Saturday's forecast shows a daytime high a few digits above zero with rain, which will take a sharp turn overnight.

"As that system is coming through Alberta, it starts as rain on Saturday morning, and as that cold front swings through, it does change over to snow at some point through the overnight hours," says Mauti.

Though it's too far out to tell how much snow will fall on the Foothills, she expects locales southwest of us will see more significant snowfall than in Okotoks or High River.