During Thanksgiving week, Hill residents must have been extremely grateful for their life and friends here. The reward was significant rain and the first snowfall of the 2016-17 winter season.

The U.S. Forest Service’s Keenwild Ranger Station recorded 1.2 inches of rain from Saturday through Sunday evening. In Pine Cove, 1.76 inches of rain fell and another 4 inches of snow came down, too.

Since July 1, total rainfall at Keenwild has been nearly 5 inches, which is close to the long-term average rainfall of 5.9 inches through the end of November.

In Pine Cove, rainfall has been 6.5 inches since July 1, which already exceeds this historic average.

However, in prior years, abundant rain fell during the first half of the rain year and the rainy months — January through March — proved disappointing.

Just last year, precipitation through November was nearly 7 inches at Keenwild and more than 8 inches in Pine Cove. Yet the total rain through June 30 again was below average. In 2014, more than 9 inches of rain fell through early December, but the drought persisted.

The last year Keenwild exceeded the average annual rain was 2011, when 29.4 inches fell.