Just So - Rewilding ourselves at a magical family festival!

We have just returned from a wonderful weekend at what I think might just be one of the most wholesome, loving, wild and magical family festivals in the UK right now. 

When I first came across Just So Festival in Cheshire I was mostly looking at a good venture for our business. The Wild Spark is still very young and it seemed like the ideal place to trade and make ourselves a little more known with families who may share our love of the outdoors and our nature based products. Little did I know what we were in for!

On arrival it soon became apparent that the vibe here was very much of one big family. And as I set up I was welcomed in very quickly by fellow vendors, staff and festival goers. Many have loyally attended this festival for over 10 years and all had such positive things to say about the event. 

Over the three day event I chatted to so many people. We felt well-received and welcomed into the fold, and immediately I knew we were part of something very special.

The whole festival had such a safe, wholesome and magical feel to it. I knew Alfie (who was wizzing off to different activities and events with his Aunty and our friends) was having an absolute blast. Every so often he would reappear to eat and tell me about his adventures...mud kitchen, giant marble run, painting, dancing, watching amazing and hilarious art performances, giant bubble shows, circus skills, building wacky race cars, meeting giant puppets...I could go on! 

And while all this was happening I was interacting with the festival too. While trading at my tent, I also had a secret stash of golden pebbles.

This was one of my favourite parts of the festival. At Just So you pick an animal team (fish, frogs, foxes, owls, lions, stags or bees), dress up if you like (lots and lots of people do) and then through the festival you can earn golden pebbles for doing all sorts of things - random acts of kindness, telling jokes or sharing facts, showing skills and talents, or sometimes just because!

The children don't know who might have pebbles so they have to be canny. They hand their pebbles into the head animal of each team and at various parts of the weekend everyone is updated with the scoreboard. It ends with the Carnival of the Animals finale where final scores are counted after each group of animals make their appearance to the main stage in a procession. It gets pretty exciting and it's another layer to the festival which makes it extra magical and brings everyone together. "Go Stags!" you cry out to another family that walk past in costume. "Are fish in the lead? We need to catch up!" It breaks the ice, brings strangers together and is just an all-round fun activity. Some children spend all weekend on the hunt for pebbles!

And the day doesn't end when the sun goes down. As I clocked off my stand we explored the woods and the different stages experiencing incredible music, (The Armagh Rhymers was my personal favourite) fire shows and even a breath-taking hire wire act from Bullzini. The party goes on long into the night. At 3 years old 10pm was as much as Alfie could manage but we had such a wonderful time. 

It's also interesting to note that the festival also goes to great lengths to run as sustainably as possible - lots of recycling bins, composting toilets, no single use plastics, food vendors with a great variety of locally sourced food, recycled and re-used materials in activities. And everyone working at the festival is asked to offset their travel miles too. Putting these additional constraints onto any event can be a logistical challenge but it was impressively executed.

As we drove home from the festival (a nearly 7 hour drive) I mulled over the weekend in my head, thinking about the incredible, enriching and wonderous things we had done. And the most amazing part for me was seeing families just enjoying the moment, no sea of phones, just laughter and love from wildlings young and old.

The festival is taking a break next year but you can guarantee we will be going again when it returns in 2026!

Thank you to everyone who came by and shopped with us there. We hope you all had a wonderful time and are enjoying your new resources for your next adventures!