Has Many through factory with fabricator

gistfile1.rb

class Country < ActiveRecord::Base
  has_many :registrations
  has_many :members
  has_many :distribution_groups, :through => :members
end

class DistributionGroup < ActiveRecord::Base
  has_many :members
  has_many :countries, :through => :members
end

class Member < ActiveRecord::Base
  belongs_to :country
  belongs_to :distribution_group
end

Fabricator(:country) do
  name { Faker::Address.country }
end 

Fabricator(:member) do
end

Fabricator(:distribution_group) do
  name { Faker::Lorem.words(3).join(" ") }
  after_build do |distribution_group|
    2.times { Fabricate(:member, :distribution_group => distribution_group, :country => Fabricate(:country)) }
  end
end

If a Member has to have a country, then you can declare that in the Fabricator and it will generate one automatically and associate it. You can still override it at Fabricate time by passing one in explicitly, but in that case you wouldn't have to.

Fabricator(:member) do
  country
end