Weekend Project - The Fountain of Youth

No, I haven't actually found The Fountain of Youth, sorry to disappoint. However we are youthful and we did make a fountain this weekend. Here's the recap of this rather easy weekend project:

Here's step 1: spray any of the pots that aren't waterproof with the waterproofing spray.
While that's drying (it took our brand 24 hours to dry), build a mesh fence to keep the rocks away from the pump - proper flow around the pump is ideal, most pumps have some built in spacing element, but we figured the more the better.
The bricks and mesh also help support the smaller pot, which will sit right on the spout.

We then placed the smaller pot on the spout and filled in the area with the stone pebbles. One of the asthetic things I really wanted was for water to fill the small pot and bubble out of it. When we first turned it on this didn't happen, the water came out of the fountain and then leaked through the hole in the bottom of the pot! We could have caulked up or cemented the hole, but being inclined to not make another trip to the hardware store, I just took a ziploc bag, cut a hole slightly smaller than the spout in it and forced it over the spout. After holding it down with a few rocks, it isn't 100% waterproof, but it slows down the leaking enough that the pot fills up and bubbles over.
 Of course, it would be nice if it were just this easy. However, after installing the first pump we turned the gadget on, and it whined like a banshee without pushing much water. So we drive back to the hardware store, return that pump and buy another one. Immerse this one in water, plug in and... enjoy the mechanical screeching sound. Now we've had enough of this hardware store, after returning the new banshee, we head to the other hardware store across town, find yet another pump, drive back, put this one in the water, and engage it at full speed to hear... gentle bubbling! Finally, the relaxing fountain we were looking forward to. Let this also be a lesson to try out the pump before fully building the fountain and rock around it.
 Here are another couple of pictures of the finished product. We can take off the fountain's bell attachment for even more soft bubbling sounds:

 Tools:

• Wire cutters

Purchase breakdown:

• Large tub
• Small pot
• Rocks
• Pump
• Wire mesh
• Bricks
• Can of sealant

Price:

• Tools: $0 (Pliers and clippers help for the mesh)
• Supplies: $127
• Total: $127