About

Hey there! I’m Jemma – so nice to meet you.

A little about me. I’m a mom of two college-aged boys, living in San Diego.

I first started my 50 Weeks to 50 blog in the year before I turned 50. Prior to hitting the half century mark, I was thinking about ways to celebrate what I considered the start of the best years of my life. I decided to start my 50 Weeks to 50 blog, where I took the whole year and experience life the way it should be – trying out new adventures. I did everything from skydiving to ballooning, from running naked on the beach to getting a tarot card reading, from staying at a homeless shelter to attending the RiSE Festival.

It’s not a bucket list, because I don’t plan on kicking the bucket any time soon. But rather getting some activities done prior to getting too physically old to do some of these things. Plus, even as I’m putting my to-do’s together for future activities, I keep adding more and more items, so I know that I will never completely finish checking off my list. I have been fortunate in that I have done some extraordinary things and visited exotic places prior to writing my 50 Weeks to 50 blog. So if you’re wondering why riding elephants in Thailand, white water river rafting in California, swimming with dolphins in the Bahamas, or cave hiking in the Philippines are not on my list, well, ehh – been there, done that!

During my year of 50 Weeks to 50, I met my partner Richard, who is six weeks younger than I am – yes, I’m a cougar. Together, we’ve had even more adventures together: visiting his home of Liverpool and going to the clubs where the Beatles started; traveling to postcard perfect islands of Greece – Santorini, Milos, Paros – while having our Amazing Race moments when you get a bad taxi driver that gets you to your ferry late, as we see it starting to close the gates and slowly churn away while we try to wave and yell for them to stop; four-wheeling it through the rainforest roads of Costa Rica and running with a thousand orphaned dogs; our tiny travels with our teardrop trailer; and many more travels. Of course, the biggest adventure is living together and creating a life as a couple.

Since the end of my 50 Weeks to 50 blog, various friends have asked if I was planning to blog again. I kept answering that I would, but I have been putting it off. I thought I could do something before I turned 55 – thrive at 55, alive at 55, strive at 55. Nothing seemed to be it. But the other day that one thing that I always enjoy is eating. Food is life. Sometimes it’s fabulous, others not so much. Sometimes it’s exciting, others kinda scary. Sometimes it’s sweet, and others sour.

So I decided on a whim to write about the Voices of My Plate. I am lucky in that I can dine out often, many times to check out restaurants for my magazine TravelHost San Diego. Plus I have friends and family that like to host meals. Occasionally, I will cook too!

Through Voices of My Plate, I’ll share my journey of food – a topic most of us enjoy. Eating, cooking, photographing – I need to put all those Instagram photos to use. Hold on and share this adventure with me. Some weeks will be new and exciting tastes, while others may be basic sustenance. All I know is that food and writing both make me happy, and it’s important to keep yourself happy. Because, I see this blog is a gift to myself.

And feel free to invite me to your table, that makes me happy too!

Enjoy and Peace.

Jemma

P.S. While I’m building up my Voices from My Plate posts, go look at my 50 Weeks to 50 Table of Contents page and check out those 50 posts.