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Posts
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How do I set up a sidebar just to introduce the site and say, “Hi, I’m Regina, aka as Mutley. I love learning about”… ? When I click and drag the about me widget, where do I type and where does my picture come from? Can I also add my favorite blog posts on this side bar? Thank you.
The blog I need help with is mutley53.wordpress.com
Hi Regina. Don’t use the About.me widget. That’s a special widget for the About.me website. Instead you can use the Text/HTML widget or the Gravatar widget, unless you actually want to use the About.me widget! With regard to adding favorite blog posts, do you mean favorite blog posts on your blog or favorite blog posts that you see on WordPress.com?
Thank you for responding to quickly. I’m referring to favorite blog posts that I have written. My blog posts are so hidden, and I want to to alert readers that they are there. Or, is there another lay-out I can use to post titles of all posts, and readers can just click on which ones they want to read? Or would that involve a new theme? Thank you.
Hi Regina. For showcasing your favorite blog posts I suggest using the Text/HTML widget in combination with a category of your choosing. So, for example, you could make a category of Favorite posts and display those posts in your sidebar using the Text/HTML widget with the following code:
[display-posts category="favorites" posts_per_page="5"]You can see more options for this shortcode here. Hope that helps!
Hi Regina,
Just following up with you. Do you still need assistance or are you all set?
I’m sorry not to have responded faster, but I didn’t try doing the side bar until today [7/25]. I used the Text/HTML widget; wrote my greeting; and clicked saved. How does it display? I don’t see it on my post. Also, where do I click and drag Category, so I can list my favorite posts [that I did] in this same sidebar?
Hi Regina,
Your greeting appears as the very first widget in the sidebar. Are you happy with the way it looks? Widgets will only display in the sidebar, and not inside posts.
I think Philip was suggesting that you:
1. First create a category called “Favorites”.
2. After you create a “Favorites” category (just like you have categories for “Exercise”, “Fruit and Vegetables”, etc) , go through your posts and assign all of your favorite ones to the “Favorites” category.
3. Next, go back to Appearance > Widgets and drag a Text Widget into the sidebar. Inside that widget, paste the following code: [display-posts category="favorites" posts_per_page="5"]
Do those steps make sense? Let me know if I can clarify them further or if you have any other questions.
You are fast. Thank you. I see the sidebar now. How can I darken and enlarge the font? It looks OK, but it’s tiny. I will try the category instructions a bit later and let you know how it goes. I really appreciate all the help you guys give me!
Hi Regina,
We’re very happy to help. :)
Since you have the Custom Design upgrade, you can use CSS to make the widget text larger and darker. I’m not sure how much larger you want it, but this is a start (we can always adjust it later). Paste this into the CSS Editor (You can find that under Appearance > Custom Design > CSS ):
.widget {
color: #000000;
font-size: 1.5rem;
}This will make the text black and increase the font size.
Hi Regina,
Just checking in with you. Are you all set or do you still need assistance?
Sorry to take so long to get back to you. I pasted your instructions to my CSS a while back, but nothing changed. I tried it again this evening, and so far the font size or darkness as not changed. It’s been about 5 to 6 minutes. Maybe it will take a longer time. for now, I’ll go and try working on the categories for the side bar. thank you for you help and follow-up.
I’m finally getting around to the categories. I made a “favorites “category, but how do I assign my posts to this category? Do I click on the little box to the left of the post’s title? If so, what then? Thank you.
Hi Regina,
Can you try the following CSS instead? I just made a small change to the units on the font size:
.widget {
color: #000000;
font-size: 15px;
}This will change the font size and color on the widgets in the sidebar. Do you want to change the font size and color for the main body text? If so, this should do the trick:
body {
color: #000;
font-size: 17px;
}I see that you’ve already adjusted the font size and color inside your posts, so the above CSS may not make a difference in how the text looks for those posts.
I’m finally getting around to the categories. I made a “favorites “category, but how do I assign my posts to this category? Do I click on the little box to the left of the post’s title? If so, what then? Thank you.
Please see these instructions for assigning your posts to categories: http://en.support.wordpress.com/posts/categories/
Let me know if you have any other questions.
Howdy! Just checking in. Did the above solution work for you?
Thank you all for your faithful follow-ups. I’m slow at getting to this categories thing. It scares me, since [as you can probably tell] I’m tech challenged. But will try. Also, the last instructions for enlarging the font on side bar widget worked. It just took some time to show up. Thank you.
Hi! I made a new category for favorites. But how do I assign my posts to this new category? Do I just use the Add New Category on the Edit/Post Page? And can I make the Favorite specific? for example: Favorites – Human Body; favorites- Principles of Health; Favorites – Tributes? Thanks.
Hi there, you can add categories to your posts either one-by-one on each post page, or using the bulk edit tool:
http://en.support.wordpress.com/posts/categories/#adding-categories-via-the-categories-module
http://en.support.wordpress.com/posts/edit-posts-screen/#bulk-edit
And can I make the Favorite specific? for example: Favorites – Human Body; favorites- Principles of Health; Favorites – Tributes? Thanks.
Sure, you could do that. Or, you could create a “parent” category called Favorites, and then make sub-categories below that. You can do that by selecting Favorites as the parent category from the drop-down menu on the category page:
https://mutley53.wordpress.com/wp-admin/edit-tags.php?taxonomy=category
Screenshot: http://cl.ly/image/1A23140U1M2Y
If you have questions about anything else, please feel free to start a new thread!
I finally got the Favorite Posts on the side bar, but have no idea how to make it the parent category, or how to add the sub-categories. I appreciate your response, but I’m confused by the instructions. Can you help me with extremely simple steps. Thank you.
Hi there, re-reading the entire thread I think it may be best to scratch the sub-categories idea, since I just realized those categories already exist. In other words, you already have a category called Principles of Health.
Could you let me know about how many favorite posts in total you want to link to, and how often you might want to change them? If there’s not that many it may be simplest to do this manually through a text widget, and I’d be glad to show you how to do that.
Thank you for your response. My goal in doing this Favorites Category is to help readers quickly see past posts and choose what they want to look at. Right now there is no way they can see that without scrolling through everything. That would be time consuming.
So, I’d like to have a Favorites category, then a drop-down for the sub-categories. I have 7 sub-categories:
1. Human body
2. Principles of Health
3. Disease
4. Tributes
5. What I’ve Learned
6. About MS
7. Miscellaneous
I’d like to assign each of my posts to one of these sub-categories.
I’ve been able to put the Favorites category in place using Widgets Categories, and check the Hierarchy box, but there is no explanation on how to add the sub-categories, or assign each post to a sub-category.
Is there some other way to get readers to see all the posts, on that front side-bar? Archives has posts for each month, but a reader can’t see which ones without scrolling through all. Thank you for hanging in there with me.
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