Touting for sponsored posts for #britmumslive

I'm new to all of this, well I've been blogging since October 2009 and with an average of 6000+ hits per month I'm obviously doing something right. I don't go looking for things, they come and find me.

This year I've decided to attend Britmums Live on June 21-22nd. I want to learn more about blogging, no follow links (should I ever get anything to review) Raising my profile and awareness of adults with disabilities in South Africa, meeting and sharing expat experiences with the aim to support others taking the first and very difficult steps. Support groups for when you're children leave home, as mine is doing in September to return to UK boarding school and the depression that comes with dealing with all of this.

So what I need is a start, a push, someone who knows what they're doing and is willing to mentor me down the difficult route of touting/begging for further help.

Can you RT the tweet with link, share this post, actually sponsor me, offer me support and guidance on how to word these things correctly?

Here's what I've written to date. I will tailor it to individual companies, but if you have any contacts that you're willing to share, please let me know.

Gratefully yours

Suzanne

I’m a British expat living with two teenage sons in South Africa since 2011. I travel to the UK on a regular basis to visit parents and adult children. I also take the opportunity to visit friends and my destinations are Bath (Mother in Law) Monmouth (Parents) Gloucester (Step children: Son aged 24, Disabled daughter, aged 25) Leeds (Son aged 21) Leamington Spa, St Albans and various locations in London. This trip has also involved two camping trips to Devon (friends) and Cornwall (MIL)

Future travel will include UK trip in September to settle son into boarding. Camping with pets and Kruger National Park. Climbing Kilimanjaro to raise funds for adults with disabilities in South Africa.

Whilst travelling I tweet as @chickenruby with 2225 followers and I blog over at http://www.chickenruby.com with, according to Stats, 6000+ hits per month.

I blog about:

·         Life as an expat, from saying goodbye to purchasing a car, with hints and tips.

·         Raising teenagers from buying condoms to relocating youngest back in the UK education system and full time boarding.

·         Fundraising for Adults with disabilities in South Africa

·         Depression

·         Dealing with the unexpected

·         Disability

·         Fundraising and supporting www.kwo.org.za and www.santashoebox.co.za

I am a featured blogger over at Internations, Expatsblog.com, Mumsnet, Netmums, Britmums. I have written articles for Mark Warner on holidaying with teenagers (published soon) Currencies Direct on purchasing a car as an expat (published soon) and featured on the expat HSBC top 5 tips on dealing with depression.

I am currently in the UK to evict tenants from our family home, find a suitable boarding school that supports dyslexia for my 14 year old son and to attend Britmums live 21^st-22^nd June. BritMums Live will attract 500 attendees and is the only conference dedicated entirely to the parent blogging audience of more than 4k influential and engaged bloggers

I will and have been blogging and tweeting about my experiences and adventures since arriving in the UK May 22^nd. I have an open ticket to return with Emirates Airlines as soon as the necessary repairs have been completed to my property.

What I am looking for is a sponsor for the following and products to review. In exchange I will advertise your company/organization at Britmums Live. I will tweet and blog with follow links, where appropriate, on my website. I do accept guest posts but only with personal experiences and I have guest posted for various bloggers.

Please let me know what you would be interested in helping me with.

Monetary

Britmums ticket                                  £ 80

Train travel                                         £150

Additional luggage to take hand made hats, scarves and donations to www.kwo.org.za for adults and children with disabilities in South Africa. Cost unknown

Food and drink for rest of duration and stay whilst travelling approximately £10 per day

Hotel in London 2 nights                     £160

Products

Outfit for Britmums inc printing        £100

Painting and decorating supplies

Carpet cleaner

Dry cleaning for curtains

 

                                               

 

 

Court Orders and Visa applications

OMFG I’ve had enough, I’ve heard it all now.

We hired an agency that quite frankly has been more than less than useless.
We applied for our initial visa from the UK and it took 6 weeks, lots of return trips with additional paperwork that they forget to tell you about.
So we renew our application in South Africa and everything is pretty much the same...or so you’d think.
The home office has requested the court order for my custody of the kids from a divorce 12 years ago. There isn’t one. We agreed to divorce, sell the house split the profits and debts 50/50. The kids stayed living with me, there were no formal arrangements, they stayed with their dad when they wanted to, he pays a regular sum into my bank account, goes half on school uniform/trips/soccer gear etc. We discuss the holidays and consult with one another before booking, we leave Christmas as a last minute arrangement, and there’s been no stress. He wrote a letter to the Home Office for our initial application to say he gave permission for them to live with me and hubby and to move to South Africa in the first place.

I hope that we don’t need the court order; I don’t want to rock a boat that isn’t unsteady in the first place.

Sorry goes a long way

I've been up since 3am this morning, you know how it is?...your head is spinning...

So I got up...I'm not angry, I'm disappointed, we made so much effort prior to moving to South Africa to ensure that when we got here, the UK side of things would run itself and the bits we'd put into place would ensure a smooth transistion...we were wrong.

The bank let us down, the agent let us down, the removal firm let us down, the electric and gas company let us down, the insurance companies let us down and certain people let us down...

It was difficult to get hold of these people, get them to reply to emails, an automated response was easy enough 'we will reply to your email in the next two working days' in most cases I had to re email them to remind them, spend a fortune on hold or listening to music at a UK call centre (probably cheaper if I'd just called India direct)

I notified ALL the UK companies of our move to South Africa and requested all urgent communication was made via email. I have an acknowledgement letter or email off each and every one...

So what happens?

Threats of Court Orders and bailiffs, (for small sums of money in total no more than £300) lost furniture, cancelled bank cards...you name it we've had it and as a result I now have had to inform EVERYONE of change of address (again)...

And not one person or company has said 'sorry'