Michelle Damiani
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Michelle Damiani
  • Buy my books/
  • Blog/
  • Travel/
    • Spello
    • Visiting Umbria
    • Travel in Italy
    • Around the World
  • What I Love/
    • Books and Movies
    • Food and Drink
    • Gabe's Blog
    • Italian Cats and Hidden Madonnas
  • Coaching/
  • About/
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Michelle Damiani

writing with Italy at heart

Blog

The journey continues.

Michelle Damiani
  • Buy my books/
  • Blog/
  • Travel/
    • Spello
    • Visiting Umbria
    • Travel in Italy
    • Around the World
  • What I Love/
    • Books and Movies
    • Food and Drink
    • Gabe's Blog
    • Italian Cats and Hidden Madonnas
  • Coaching/
  • About/

Welcome to a corner of the internet where Italy, storytelling, and savoring life meet. Whether you’re dreaming of your next trip, exploring Italian roots, or just looking for a more delicious way to live, you’ll find inspiration here. Want the newest essays, travel tips, and recipes before anyone else? They always land first in The Grapevine.


July 09, 2023

Corn Nuts at the Cultural Center

July 09, 2023/ Michelle Damiani
Corn Nuts at the Cultural Center

My quest for Italian citizenship begins with the B1 language exam at the Italian Cultural Society. There were a few, er, hurdles. Some of them crunchy.

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July 09, 2023/ Michelle Damiani/ 10 Comments
blog
language, citizenship
September 14, 2020

Village-Schooled

September 14, 2020/ Michelle Damiani
Village-Schooled

Our kids are getting an education the likes of which we dared not dream.

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September 14, 2020/ Michelle Damiani/ 12 Comments
Family, blog
language, art, kids, Spello
October 11, 2018

Top 10 Reasons to Send Your Teen to Language School

October 11, 2018/ Michelle Damiani
Top 10 Reasons to Send Your Teen to Language School

When Siena returned from her two week stint at language school in Arezzo, I realized that what she got from the experience was far more than an increase in Italian knowledge.

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October 11, 2018/ Michelle Damiani/ 15 Comments
blog, travel
Teens, language, travel, Tuscany, Italy
July 31, 2018

Spello è Sempre lo Stesso

July 31, 2018/ Michelle Damiani
Spello è Sempre lo Stesso

Our 2018 return to Spello, and the changes we found there.

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July 31, 2018/ Michelle Damiani/ 14 Comments
blog, travel
Spello, children, language, party, neighbors
April 08, 2018

Learning Italian. Again.

April 08, 2018/ Michelle Damiani
Learning Italian. Again.

Ideas for language training on your own.

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April 08, 2018/ Michelle Damiani/ 8 Comments
blog
language, travel
  • Buy my books/
  • Blog/
  • Travel/
    • Spello
    • Visiting Umbria
    • Travel in Italy
    • Around the World
  • What I Love/
    • Books and Movies
    • Food and Drink
    • Gabe's Blog
    • Italian Cats and Hidden Madonnas
  • Coaching/
  • About/

Michelle Damiani

Website for Michelle Damiani, author of Il Bel Centro: A Year in the Beautiful Center, the funny and heartfelt memoir of an American family living in Spello, as well as Santa Lucia, a page-turner set on the Umbria border. 

Rumors. Romance. And more than a little espresso.

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Arrived at Shibu Onsen, a hot springs town where you can buy eggs cooked in the hot springs water. More importantly, a stay gets you a key to the nine public bathhouses. You can buy a towel for a few dollars that you stamp at each of the nine bathhou
Scenes from a morning in Nagano 🇯🇵
I’ve already started eating all the things 😂🇯🇵😂 Picked up this bento box at the train station for less than $7 USD and happily ate on the train to… well, you’ll see tomorrow!
Tokyo bound 🇯🇵
Photos from our 2016 family trip to Asia. I have a feeling next week’s photos will be quite different. Check stories for a link to my post about how to survive a long haul flight. I know I’ll be revisiting those tips!
When I moved to Italy, I had to relearn the calendar — not by months, but by vegetables.
Somewhere along the way I’d convinced myself artichokes were a summer thing (why? who knows). And then February arrived and the markets exploded with
A year ago we toasted Valentine’s Day with this view, our feet plunged in warm sand after swimming around enormous starfish and before kayaking to a bioluminescent bay under a canopy of stars. This year we’re surrounded by the dregs of la
🙋🏻‍♀️Raise your hand if Angelo is your favorite “character” in my memoir of living in Italy. PS, did any of you note the dedication in my last book? I can’t wait to bring it to him in October ❤️ PS check out the video in my st
The question I get most from readers—more than How did your family move to Italy? or How did you find Spello?—is this: How do you write a book in a month?

As Grapevine readers know (sign up in my link in bio so you don’t miss a tri

A trip to Italy is better with language basics! Here’s my recommended course to learn Italian and make your trip fantastico!


Festival participant, speaking about “Il Bel Centro: A Year in the Beautiful Center”

Festival participant, speaking about “Il Bel Centro: A Year in the Beautiful Center”

Featured speaker on panel discussing Romance for “Santa Lucia”

Featured speaker on panel discussing Romance for “Santa Lucia”