Rain started falling steadily Friday morning in Oak Harbor but that’s just a taste of things to come in the next few days.

The Wal-Mart parking lot was not as full as usual as the holiday shopping season tips off. Among those rising the rain was Joanie Johnson of Anacortes. She’d taken her two children, Maddie, 4, and Corey, 3, to the swimming pool that morning and stopped at the store to pick up dog food and other essentials. “I guess we didn’t have to go to the pool to get wet,” she said as she hurried the kids into the back of the family SUV to get them out of the rain.

There will be lots of puddles, umbrellas, boots and slickers on Whidbey Island over the next few days as people struggle with rainy weather. AccuWeather.com’s “WeatherAlarm” for the Oak Harbor area is calling for heavy rain Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday with a total amount of 4.04 inches expected.

That’s a lot of rain for an area more used to steady drizzle and it will come with a lot of wind as well. The National Weather Service issued a gale warming Thursday at 9:03 a.m. for the Strait of Juan de Fuca. A gale warning means winds of 34 to 47 knots are imminent and it’s “highly recommended” that mariners without he proper experience seek safe harbor. The warning was to stay in effect at least until 5 p.m.

While windy and wet, the climate will be fairly warm for November with lows in the mid ’40s at night and highs in he upper 50s during the dav through Saturday. Temperatures are predicted to drop several degrees on Sunday and Monday as the clouds start to clear.