My husband, Rick, and I love skiing, so when we were thinking about moving to West Michigan the first thing we did was look up the annual snowfall -- we wanted to be in a place where it's snowy in the winter and beautiful in the summer. Hands down, the summers in West Michigan are unbeatable. It stays light until 10 o'clock at night and it's just magical.

 

We came here from Appleton, WI, but prior to that I spent 15 years on the East Coast -- in Boston, New York City and D.C. Back then, I spent 15 hours a week commuting -- now I spend just three hours a week. That's 12 hours of my life that I've gotten back!

 

There's so much to do in West Michigan. We've lived here three years now and are delighted that there's a small ski area nearby where we can go skiing as a family. Our four-year-old daughter was able to enter a couple of kids' ski races this winter. We take both of our kids to the Saturday morning art programs downtown at the Grand Rapids Art Museum. They also take piano and violin lessons, swimming lessons and they enjoy summer programs at Meijer Gardens.

 

For us, it's important to live in a diverse community where not every person is a carbon copy of their neighbor. We didn't want everything to be the same, because that's not very invigorating. We were pleasantly surprised by the degree of availability of different people from different backgrounds here.

 

We love going to Saugatuck in the summer, the State Parks, and going to the beach at Lake Michigan. It's great to have it all so close by. We can be at the beach in just 45 minutes.

 

Every time my husband's parents came from their home in Arkansas to visit us, they talked about how much they liked the area. We kept telling them it would be great to have them here, so they moved here last fall.

 

If anyone who's thinking about moving to West Michigan asked me about it, I'd start by telling them it's a vibrant area and that you don't have to go far to get to other areas like Northern Michigan or Chicago and Detroit. I'd tell them that pretty much every experience you want is here or you can easily get to it. That's where I'd start, and then I'd go on and on.