Store your secret trade documents in a satchel like Marco Polo

One thing I love about this satchel craft is how easily it is adaptable to any unit you might be studying.  So while I use this satchel craft for our Marco Polo unit, I could just as easily include it as part of a project for Lewis and Clark, or to contain our crafts for a country study.  The possibilities are endless.  While I extremely doubt Marco Polo used a satchel just like our craft, I do think it resembles something he might have used.

Supplies for your satchel craft

cardboard, painter’s tape*, acrylic paint*, paint brushes*

Putting together your satchel craft

First measure out the size of your satchel.  I wanted mine to fit our journal pages, so it needed to have a 9”x12” opening.    I tried different ways of folding over cardboard to get the right size and then cut it with my well-worn Fiskars scissors (once upon a time these were my fabric scissors, but they are not as sharp, so they were demoted).

Then we set to painting our satchels.  I showed the kids pictures of several different fabric samples from the time, and different projects to inspire them, and like they usually do, they did their own thing.

You might have to take a break from painting your project for one side to dry before you paint the back, or you could be like we were and stubbornly forge ahead, and make a giant mess of your table.

I bent it mostly in half, with a small flap hanging over, and then taped the sides with the painter’s tape.  This is fairly strong tape, can come up relatively easily, and most important for this project, it can be painted over.

There is a reason I always have a tablecloth on our table in pictures.  The table cover is quite stained from paint, and the table itself is slightly discolored where I spilled water without knowing it as a newlywed.

You’re now all ready to put your important documents into your satchel to keep them safe from any spies who might be trying to gain your secrets.

Tomorrow, I’ll be sharing those super imoprtant secret documents you’re about to be writing.