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I am new to this forum and will therefore shortly introduce myself first. I am Belgian and married to an American who is orginally from Frederick, Maryland. We have two children and we have never lived together as a family in the States before.
We would like to move to NC in the next few months as it is relatively close to family (most family in VA or DC area) and we want to live in a warmer climate. So NC seems like the perfect place for us.
We are looking to move to a place where it is good for children; our girls are 2 and 4, but we also want a hip spot where there is things to do.
Any suggestions or ideas which regions to look at?
when you say you want it to be warmer...
do you mean during winter or during summer?
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If your concern is being warm in the winter you should probably look considerably south of NC.
At best... you'll only have less snow with that same precipitation replaced by ice.
I don't really mind the winters being colder, as long as we have a long summer. We used to live in Barcelona, Spain, and the climate in NC is similar to there, which we loved.
THanks!
I don't really mind the winters being colder, as long as we have a long summer. We used to live in Barcelona, Spain, and the climate in NC is similar to there, which we loved.
THanks!
If this is accurate: Typical Climate and Weather in Barcelona, then add NC has a much longer, hotter summer. Add a few degrees to August, then stretch that out for a few months. If you loved the hottest days in August, then you will love NC weather. If Barcelona's June, July, and September were more to your liking, you'll be disappointed with NC.
You want "things to do." If you are more specific, people can be more helpful. Do you want to go to the beach? Mountains? Amusement parks? Museums? Walks in the park? Horseback riding? Boating? Bars? Sports leagues for adults? Spectator sports?
You may want to also check out Mt. Pleasant or some beach towns.
Charlotte, Raleigh and Greensboro are the "big" cities in NC and all have enclaves of "hip" hidden between mounds of crap, sprawl and vanilla. If I could live anywhere it wouldn't be one of the big cities... that's for sure. And I've lived in all of them...
It looks like NC is the perfect climate for us: we LOVE hot weather ;-)
With hip I mean: does the town have a nice center with a diversity of restaurants, live music,... As European, it is also important for me to be able to live somewhere where I can walk a lot. Asheville, Chapel Hill and Carrboro: do these have city centers shopping streets as well, or just strip malls where you need the car to get to them?
Overall the US isn't conducive to the walking lifestyle you describe. Not sure from your post whether you are currently here in the states or not but if you are, you will see what I mean. You might find what you describe in some cities but could only know if you visited.
Asheville is not the environment you describe, perhaps Chapel Hill? but even that is a driving society.
You haven't said where you plan to be working, but that will have a lot to do with it, as some towns/cities have better job markets than others for specific industries.
Do you want mountains or beach, urban or rural, liberal or conservative--you have not provided much information other than "warmer" and "good for children" which pretty much describe almost anywhere in the state. Do you really have an understanding of how large and varied this state is?
You will definitely need to take a visit to NC before just picking somewhere based on a message board, knowing as little as you do about the state. If you give more specific information, we might be able to help narrow down some places.
We are going in November to travel around in NC, but just because NC is so big, we want already narrow down to a few cities / towns.
Regarding work, my husband is working out something with his company, which will allow him to work from home and I will be a stay at home mom.
We like to live in a small city: a place that has a downtown, but nothing too metropolitan; below 500.000 would be great.
We prefer a liberal area with a lot of diversity concerning restaurants and shops.
As long as you're counting heads, not fingers, the 500,000 only rules out Charlotte.
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