I bought a sack of pea gravel to use to cover the top of the fountain, washed the gravel several times, then propped the container in the sun to help it dry.

Proof of concept #1: after attaching the pump to a tube that I had inserted through holes in the shell of the fountain, I placed everything over the plastic tub reservoir and filled the tub underneath through one of the drainage holes in the deck.

Proof of concept #2: plugged in the pump and water began to flow. I hadn't leveled the fountain or the reservoir, so water was running out of the tub underneath, but the design worked.

Mary wanted larger stones on the fountain and I agreed, so I got 5 gallons of rocks at Minick's and loaded part of them onto the deck of the fountain after moving it into place in the courtyard and leveled it. Pierce's yard flag is in the back.

I had moved all the back porch plants to the courtyard while we were getting the back of the house painted and we enjoyed seeing them from the sunroom. Instead of moving them back to the porch, I moved them to surround the fountain.

Water from the fountain splashes on the rocks and out of the enclosure, so the reservoir needs to be re-filled periodically (you can tell when the water level is low because the column of water from the pump is shorter. It's easy to refill the reservoir by just running water on the deck; the holes in the deck drain the water down into the reservoir.