In this video, I discuss ten reasons why you should move to Charlotte, NC.
If you don’t already know, I moved to North Carolina from New York City five years ago, and I have never looked back since. As much as New York City is part of me and will always stay that way – it was time for a change, and North Carolina seemed like the perfect place to make that change.
After all, I wanted to live in a place that is semi metropolitan with easy access to the countrysides, farming, mountains, and nature. It seems that Charlotte fit the bill for all of the above.
One of the first reasons, if anyone is considering moving here, is that people in the south are super friendly. Everyone says hello to you wherever you go, and nobody thinks you’re crazy. That was not the case when I lived in NYC. In New York, people said hi to me when I went upstate or ventured into rural areas.
If you are looking to move to a city with an attractive suburban area, Charlotte is the place to be. We have some of the nicest subdivisions around the state. Many of them have various amenities for their homeowners, such as golf club access, swimming pools, clubhouses, and tennis courts.
Charlotte has so much to offer, but you have to discover the city for yourself as it is very spread out, and only a tiny portion of it is urban-like, the Uptown, also called the Downtown area.
Many events are happening throughout the year. And if you feel adventuresome, an abundance of day trips await you within an hour or two drive, including trips to Asheville, the Outerbanks, and the Blue Ridge Mountains.
To find out more, watch my video below for the other eight reasons why you should move to Charlotte, NC.
Blog Post Photography: Featured – Clay Banks, Post: Lucianna Coelho, Conner Baker, Stephanie Klepacki, Jared Lisack
Check out my blog post on Reasons Not To Move To Charlotte NC
Or follow some ideas below.
We are often busy with this thing called life and our jobs and many other responsibilities. Undoubtedly, we all know that what’s happening around the globe right now is just painful to watch and experience. But I think it’s important to stay positive and focus on our blessings rather than our misfortunes. Hence, this is a rare moment to slow down a bit and get to know Hygge.
It’s a Scandinavian way of life that celebrates health and happiness and in other ways besides just home decor.
All text copyright Caramel Chic LLC. Please don’t copy it.
Photography: Ellieelien, Stockholm, Sweden
Charlotte NC. What happens when a long-time New Yorker permanently moves to the south? The answer is pretty simple: they experience a culture shock.
And that is what happened to me when I relocated to Charlotte NC five years ago. The south is nothing like the north, and everything here is very, very different.
For starters, one must have a car to get around the city. There is no public transportation in Charlotte NC. Sure there is a Lynx train inside the city center, but the train’s route is minimal. And not everyone wants to live downtown, also called the “uptown” area.
Charlotte City Center
In New York City, sometimes, to avoid horrendous traffic, I often skipped driving and took a subway. It saved me time, anxiety and I didn’t have to look for parking. Carless living is not optional in Charlotte unless you’re willing to spend money on rideshares.
Charlotte is a vast and spread-out town. The city center is the most congested area with its banking and government buildings and chain hotels taking prevalence. You can find various cities and neighborhoods outside of the city center, such as Meyers Park, Dillworth, Noda or up north, Huntersville, Davidson, or Cornelius. All of these towns are unique in their character.
Day trip: Mt Mitchell NC
For example, Noda is eclectic and hippy with an artsy vibe and many historic homes scattered throughout the new or restored architecture. Davidson is a college town with large houses around the area and cute downtown with family-oriented shops and eateries. On the other hand, Cornelius is a more affluent town with Peninsula lake views, upscale homes, and refined modern architecture.
Nearby Charleston SC, cool place to visit but I recommend staying overnight.
If you are looking to get dressed up and visit the ballet, you pretty much have to fly back to New York City. People here are mostly happy with being casual, and nobody even knows that there is a ballet theater in the city center. Most events are focused on live band concerts in the summer, with many new and upcoming breweries participating. There is plenty of golfing and boating around the Lake Norman area and much retail shopping in nearby malls. If you love shopping, you will not be bored here.
My kind of hiking 🙂
With many national parks and mountains nearby, there are plenty of outdoor activities such as canoeing, kayaking, hiking, mountain biking, and bird watching. You can also take a scenic drive to Blueridge Mountains or Boone to check out the mountain country life. Beaches are much farther from Charlotte NC than the mountains. That’s why most people prefer day trips to the national parks instead.
Charleston SC
If you are in a mood to check out North Carolina’s beaches, be prepared to drive about four to five hours. I always recommend staying overnight for a trip this long. Otherwise, you spend your entire day driving. Once you reach the beaches, it’s so worth it because the North Carolina beaches are beautiful and very clean. I also recommend checking out nearby SC beaches and the city of Charleston. Nonetheless, whatever you plan on doing around Charlotte NC, you must have a car.
Sunset over Lake Norman (north of Charlotte city center).
The best way to experience the joy of living in Charlotte NC is to find a neighborhood you like and get involved in your local community. Whether or not you will like living in Charlotte depends on your job satisfaction, weather, family, and community attainment. Charlotte is not a city that caters to party-goers. It’s not a city that is full of easily accessible adventures such as Manhattan. You have to find different activities on your own. However, I promise you that once you do – the possibilities are endless.
Happiness: enjoying the local activities and living in the south 🙂
Photography: Caramel Chic LLC
Desiderata. This thing called life. It can be brutal and hard, and yet sometimes it can be so appealing. Of course, it’s never a smooth road for any of us as we all have our good days and our bad times. As such, it’s tempting sometimes to look over to the familiar “neighbor’s” side of the road and see their grass looking greener. But is it? Perceptions could be deceiving, my friend.
Therefore, when we don’t appreciate our very own path, the little things in life, the people, the ordinary moments, the simplicity of living, we tend to glance at the others to seek comparisons. But are we sure that they live a sweeter existence? That they have everything that we don’t?
It’s so easy to judge, to make assumptions, and to think that someone has a better life than we do. And you know what, maybe some of them do, but we don’t know what it took for them to get there. We’re not aware of their struggles, their pain, their small unique victories, and we were not with them on their journey. We all experience life differently, and not all of us accomplish things at the same time.
That is there are no rules on how to live your life. And if there are – let’s break them! Because I think that would be a more exciting way to live anyway.
So today, I lovingly say, let’s banish the envy, and let’s try to stay focused on our journeys, our own extraordinary, distinctive adventures. And when you wake up today and start your day – look around you, my friend, make a mental gratitude list of all the things you have in your life, including a place to live and food to eat. Many on this planet still don’t have what we do: their own homes, nutritious food, proper medicine, and necessary fundamental human rights to live in dignity.
And it’s already 2021.
Ponder about this for a moment.
And while you’re thinking, take a look at the piece of old literature below. It’s called “Desiderata.” The author wrote the poem a long time ago, but the advice he provides still paints useful words of wisdom. And even today, it’s an excellent reminder of how to remain happy in spite of life’s difficulties.
“Desiderata” (Latin: “things desired”) is an early 1920s prose poem by the American writer Max Ehrmann. Although he copyrighted it in 1927, he distributed copies of it without a required copyright notice during 1933 and c. 1942, thereby forfeiting his US copyright. Largely unknown in the author’s lifetime, its use in devotional and spoken-word recordings in 1960 and 1971 called it to the attention of the world
Why is it always so easy to make a ton of New Year’s resolutions, but then it’s so hard to stick to them?
I used to make a long list of all the things “I was going” to do in the new year. In my opinion, it was a stringent way for me to raise the bar quite high for myself. Of course, most of the things that I put on the list didn’t make it to the second or third month of the new year.
Why? You ask…Because I think the list was always too long. Often written in a day. Maybe even on a paper napkin.
No wonder it wasn’t effortless.
Over the years, as I have grown in my own personal development, I relaxed my stringent lists of popular new year’s resolutions.
I always felt like everyone got up at the end of December and screamed: where is YOUR new year’s resolution? You don’t have it? Omg – you’re a loser!
Then I thought to myself, stop this nonsense. I don’t want to make any stupid resolutions. Instead, what if I do easy weekly, quarterly, and monthly goals for myself? What if I made my plans more accessible to achieve? Sort of like dividing all of my new year’s resolutions into small, manageable pieces. What if the entire new year was one big, long resolution split into small blocks of time? OMG – I must be related to Einstein.
And you know what? When I started to implement my goals into small chunks and spread them out for the entire year. I noticed that I was actually able to accomplish them. Bit by bit. Baby steps! A win!
On the other hand, what if I didn’t accomplish a goal? Well, I certainly didn’t cry about it. I just moved that goal into the next week or next month. How easy was that? Isn’t that a much less stressful way to deal with things? Forget about that long new year’s damn list. Who has time for that?
Furthermore, how about patting yourself on the back for accomplishing all the goals you did complete? Even the year before. I think we women sometimes forget and keep the standards so high for ourselves, that we don’t bother looking back at all the things we’ve done.
But glancing and noting progress is crucial to our personal and professional development. That’s why I now keep a journal of all my accomplishments. I write down even the smallest things I achieved. Because, who knows, I might forget. And then who is going to remind me when I’m having a bad day? Nobody.
As such, whenever I feel like I am not accomplishing enough, I go back and read that journal. Then I think to myself – hey – you’ve done a lot in the past few months! Good job, girlfriend! Self-pep talk – we all need it sometimes. Then I put the journal back to my files, and I move on to keep treading the path to greatness!
Let’s talk about some examples. Let’s say you want to lose weight. You make a January 1 resolution. Then January 10 is your friend’s birthday party. You go to the party, you overeat. Bam! New year’s resolution is gone! You give up. But if you decided to start over the next day or next week. You still would have a chance to make the resolution. Then why not start over? It’s very simple. Only we make it so complicated.
Another example, at the end of the year, you get all pumped up about the resolution called “get fit” and go out and join a gym. January 1, you run to the gym when everybody and their mother is waiting outside for the gym to open. Did you ever notice that beginning March, April, all the gyms usually get less crowded? That’s because the gym newbies burned out, and their new resolutions failed, so they decided to quit.
In conclusion, let me end this rant with one of my favorite anonymous quotes:
“Every day is a chance to turn things around.”
Yes, my friends, every day we have a chance to make things new and make our own new year’s resolutions and start things over.
Why not make that day today?
Let’s talk about Town Of Davidson the heart of Davidson College, located in North Carolina, and part of Mecklenburg county. But, let me ask you a question.
Are you longing to move to the suburbs? But not your average suburbs but a welcoming, magical town – just like from a fairy tale? I know you are!
If you’ve always wanted to walk out of your house, grab a newspaper (yes, they still sell those down here), and read it outside while drinking a steaming cup of fresh coffee, and maybe even people watch a little – then Davidson is THE place FOR YOU. But you have to watch my entire video (below) to fall in love with Davidson – the enchanted town of North Carolina located in Mecklenburg County.
Once you get here, you will never want to leave.
“The town of Davidson was founded with the establishment of Davidson College in 1837. In 1835, when the Concord Presbytery sought a site for a Presbyterian men’s college, churchman and planter William Lee Davidson II sold them 469 acres on a high and healthy ridge between the Catawba and Yadkin rivers. The college was named for his father, General William Lee Davidson who was killed fighting the British at the Battle of Cowan’s Ford in 1781.” – Davidson Historical Society
Click here for a timeline of town history.
Davidson is a small town located within proximity to Lake Norman and twenty five minute drive to Charlotte City Center. This bicycle and pet-friendly small municipality has a historic college feel with considerable modern updates. The town’s antique feel has been preserved, and locals love to sit outside, play chess games, walk their dogs, meet for coffee, or play sports with their children in nearby green parks.
Most people visit Davidson’s downtown Main Street area, where its boutique charm attracts locals as well as visitors from Charlotte and even curious tourists from beyond the state lines.
Want to grab a delicious meal? Check out various local cuisines scattered around the neighborhood. Need a romantic weekend getaway? Book a traditional small hotel called Davidson Village Inn and enjoy breakfast in bed cooked up by Famous Toastery. As its name states, it’s a famous local breakfast establishment with multiple locations. I’ve tried their breakfast on various occasions and was never disappointed.
As you can see, The Town of Davidson is truly unique, gracious, and beautiful. As a matter of fact, I had no problems striking up a conversation with total strangers. Some of which used to live in NYC or Chicago. It turns out that in Davidson you can say “hello” to just about anyone without them looking at you like you’ve lost your mind. Now, that’s refreshing for a girl like me who used to live in the crazy Brooklyn, NY – where saying “hi” to a complete stranger meant that you wanted something.
However, that’s not the case here in the south, especially in the warm, and friendly Town of Davidson, where everywhere you go, people smile and are delighted to talk to you.
What is the secret?
Most probably, the quality of life and careful town government planning assuring that citizens are well cared for, and locals strive for a common goal – creating a vibrant sense of community where everyone is looking out for each other. Sounds like a dream doesn’t it.
Don’t believe me?
Check it for yourself!
Watch my Town Of Davidson – Christmas Tour video and let yourself be enchanted.
Photography: Caramel Chic LLC, Jon Tyson Photo by Annie Spratt
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