The obsession all started on June 16th, 2000. It was Jen's birthday, and to celebrate, I bought my first saltwater aquarium. She got a watch. Fortunately, she enjoys the aquariums too so she doesn't hold it against me! Our first tank was a 50 gallon reef tank. Soon after, we added a 6 gallon nano, which houses a Coral Banded Shrimp, and a 20 gallon dedicated to mushrooms, zooanthids, a few other softies, and eventually a maroon clown and host bubble tip anemone.

After we got engaged, we started thinking about buying a house and of course, it had to have a spot for a nice big indoor swimming pool...er, fish tank. In the summer of 2004, after telling our realtor that one of the prerequisites is a wall that can be replaced with a fish tank, we found our first house.

Most people worry about packing, moving their belongings, getting settled...Not us. The first thing we did, with help from my dad (he seems to really enjoy destroying walls, so he did the actual hammer swinging) was knock down the wall where the tank was going.

On August 31, 2004, I drove down to Ft. Lauderdale to pick up our custom 225 gallon starphire tank. The tank would be located so that it divided the front and back rooms of the house. On March 19, 2005, the first batch of live rock went in.