The fairy princess

Yesterday, we drove up into the mountains to go to a festival called MFest.  The ‘M’ as in ‘mother’…  MFest is: ‘A Celebration of Motherhood and the Creativity of Woman‘.   It was the day before Mother’s Day, and I believe the festival happens every year, in Springbrook, QLD, at the Springbrook State School grounds, way at the top of the Gold Coast’s hinterland.  It just so happened to be raining a little that day, I’m sure the rain scared a few people away… but… if you’re going to Springbrook, you can expect a bit of rain!  Doesn’t hurt to pack your gumboots and something warm to wear!  After all, you are practically in the clouds on top of that mountain!

We arrived a little early, people were still setting up their stalls, and it was raining, so rather than sit in the car and wait, I decided to take the girls about ten minutes up the road to a really cool nature walk called, ‘The Best of All Lookout‘.  This walk is really awesome, it’s short, it’s  paved and meanders through some absolutely pristine rainforest.  You can see these ‘ancient arctic beech trees’ that are reportedly over 2000 years old.  If you look close enough, you might even see little fairies living under rocks covered in moss 😉  We didn’t make it far on the walk.  I had one girl on my back, and one girl on my front, and an umbrella, and it was cold and windy, so we turned around.  I’ve been there before, and while the lookout might not be best of all, it is pretty cool.  Margo was pretty excited though, that we were actually ‘in’ a cloud.

Back to the festival and (yay) the sun was shining again.  We hopped out of the car and had a look around.  It was sort of small and intimate, and had one large tent with live music, food stalls, craft and information, etc. and other smaller tents and stalls scattered around.  I have to say, it was a very mixed bag of people attending this event!  It was not just mother’s toting around babes and kids!  There were all sorts of people from all walks of life!

Margo got her face painted by a ‘Funksta’ Facepainting, of course, she wanted something pink…

Funksta Facepainting

And, the gem of the day (well for me anyway) were two woman giving talks about the placenta.. yes.. the placenta… We all sat around in this cozy tent with pillows and rugs.  They even had a stuff placenta as a prop.  One woman was a doula and the other was a midwife student.  One of the woman, Lauren Manners, based in south Brisbane, gave me her card, her business is called www.accomplishedbirth.com.  She specializes in placenta encapsulation.  I was stoked to hear that you can encapsulate a placenta, even if it’s been in the freezer for some time… like a couple years even… I might have to ring her up and have mine done one day.  They talked about the importance of the placenta, it’s role in sustaining life, the benefits of delayed cord clamping and the rituals of different cultures and even animals when dealing with the placenta.  Very cool stuff!

The stuffed placenta

Anyway, the day was a success.  We only stayed about an hour and a half or so, it started raining again, so we high tailed it back to the car.  Margo loved being in the clouds.  I liked being on top of the mountains, and Goldie slept both ways in the car.  I even won a raffle ticket!!!  Woohoo!  Some family voucher to go camping!  Looks like we’ll be heading back to the mountains again soon. My only advice if you’re going to Springbrook is to not forget your gumboots!