This post originally appeared on the Slow Travel Tours blog in June, 2023.
This past May we had a small-but-mighty group of travelers on an unforgettable adventure with Adventures in Italy. I was thrilled to welcome Michelle Schratz, AKA raspberrybluesky to lead the group in creative play! Michelle attended a workshop in 2022 and we got to talking…which ended up with me inviting her back to teach this year. Michelle has a super playful style and reminds us not to get hung up on perfection. This “permission” to play and try things really opened up opportunities for everyone to experiment with new methods of creating art in making travel journals. For a lot of the group, the biggest new thing was using the sewing machine to stitch on paper, and add extra threads to the rubber band that holds the book together.
The group used stencils, watercolor and acrylic paints, watercolor and water-resistant crayons, and found papers to create pages for the travel journals.
Art journalers are scavengers. We took paper placemats, promotional flyer, maps, business cards…wine labels! Any kind of paper in our path was fair game.
Along with creative time, we had cultural excursions and lots of meals, which all also became opportunities to forage for materials for our books. At Pozzo della Cava we learned about the history of the over 1200 caves beneath Orvieto.
We had a fabulous tour of the Duomo with Lucianna. May is a great time to be in Orvieto as the corporal cloth is on display. You’ll have to see for yourself!
Locally produced olive oil and traditional Umbrian foods and wines were on the evening menu at Bartolomei, guided by our sommelier, Graziella.
We visited Lorenzo at his farm, Casale Polegri, and cooked a delicious lunch.
To cap off the week, we visited Palazzone for wine tasting and a beautiful look back at Orvieto on the rock.
Michelle coordinated with Federico Badia to create a special way to keep our travel journals together, so we had a field trip to the shop.
We shared our journals over aperitivi at the Blue Bar. It was an unforgettable adventure of a week sharing stories and pieces of ourselves with these wonderful women. Find yourself an adventure of your own and join us!
Michelle Schratz will be returning in September, 2025. Learn more HERE
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