Travel Journaling

I’ve been making travel journals for as long as I can remember, to the extent that the bookshelf that is dedicated to them is now maxed out. When Clara was little, I used to ask her for her top 10 favorite things from a trip, and then as she got older, journaling became more of a who/what/where/when memory-keeping device. A lot of you have asked me how I create them, so here you go.

First of all, find a thin blank journal that isn’t too big. I like these from Muji. I specify thin, because it’s nice to have one journal per long trip (I also only do these on longer trips), and you don’t want to have a lot of blank pages. I like to use MT masking tape, the slim ones, and I bring along brightly colored pens (I recently discovered watercolor pens and love them), watercolors, watercolor postcards, invisible mounts, and corners. I don’t ever watercolor directly into the journal, but I will paint something (I’m no artist, but watercolors are so forgiving, and so relaxing!) onto the postcard and then put that in, using the corners. Corners are also great for storing postcards or anything that you might want to frame at some point.

These are the tools. Throw them into a bag and on your trip, collect business cards, receipts, ticket stubs, flowers, leaves, even paper napkins—all of these are perfect for taping into the journal. During the trip, I slip them all into an envelope to keep them protected until I’m ready to put them in, which usually happens on a train or a plane (and often on the ride home!). There is no wrong way to do this—it might feel childlike the first time you do it, but trust me, when you look back at them, you’ll thank me.