Lake Effect Snow

I live right on the south shore of Lake Erie in downtown Cleveland.  I’ve been watching out the window all day as it has been snowing like crazy just a half a mile from downtown, even though it hadn’t snowed at all until a few minutes ago.  This is lake effect snow, where the cold air crosses the relatively warm lake, picks up moisture, then dumps the moisture as snow as the air rises just south of the lake.  Here’s the really odd thing… even though it is currently snowing at a rate of about an inch an hour, I can see the sun shining in the west and there is blue sky above.  It’s very odd.  I wonder if this will be an inch of lake effect snow or an epic one or two or three feet.  One time two years ago in December we got 18 inches in 9 hours, all while the sun (or moon) was out.