Some residents in southeastern Manitoba have found a great way to enjoy the below normal temperatures we have been seeing this spring.

According to Environment Canada, average highs for this time of year are right around plus 10 degrees. Stella Unrau says her brother owns a field that floods every year and the abnormally cold weather means the field has frozen into a giant ice rink for the last few weeks.

"We took a couple of days and went out there and the ice is incredibly smooth and there are acres of ice there. The kids put on their skates, a little shooting the puck back and forth, and practicing skating for the little guy who can’t quite skate very well yet and made the best of it. It was a lot of fun."

Local Meteorologist Scott Kehler says it has been unseasonably chilly because cold air has been dropping into Manitoba from the Arctic.

"We have been in a pattern where a cold pocket of air has been located over eastern North America and because of that it has been putting southern Manitoba in a northerly flow directing our air mass from the Arctic as opposed to what we would normally see this time of year which is off the Pacific Ocean."

Kehler says we can expect the cold weather to let up in the near future.

"It looks like we will probably have to put up with about a week of below normal temperatures but bear in mind this time of year means under plus 10 degrees for a high so it is actually not that cold. Probably in about a weeks time, we will see temperatures closer to normal which means we are often getting into the double digits."

Kehler says there is a system in the area that may bring snow Wednesday night and into Thursday morning. He notes the bulk of the storm is tracking south into the Dakotas and Minnesota but there is a small chance it could change course and bring some heavy precipitation to the Southeast.