Born and raised in Pennsylvania, I can relate to your story. My wife, three daughters and I moved here 10 years ago, to the Hickory, NC area. This is definetly the most snow in one storm that I have seen in my ten years here. (We measured 10″ at our house) . I would also say, that in the ten years here, municipal and state crews seem to be better prepared as each season passes. The one thing that doesn’t seem to change, is the lack of common sense in regard to winter driving. Watching the news on Friday night, I was amazed to see people driving at excessive speeds, for conditions. My son-in-law is a deputy sheriff for a local County, and he also could not believe the behaviors of some of the folks on the road. Hopefully, this is the last of snow that we will see this winter!

When we moved here from upstate NY the day after Christmas in 1995, our moving van got stuck as we left behind two feet of snow. We arrived here to sunshine & 70 degree weather! Two weeks later we got 6″ of snow, sleet, and freezing rain complete with power outages. We couldn’t believe all the craziness caused by that little bit of winter weather. Then in Sept. Hurricane Fran hit the Triangle hard, we’d never seen anything like it. Fourteen years later we’re still here and we’ve seen all sorts of weather – You never know what the forecast will bring, just part of the fun:)

Here’s a link to the national weather service past events for Raleigh – http://www.erh.noaa.gov/rah/events/

January of 2000 brought the most snow that we’ve seen here, with 2′ on the ground at one point.

You eventually get used to the grocery store rush and the schools closing at the first sign of a snowflake…