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1. jobakes
   Member
   Feb 8, 2012, 8:33 PM

   Hi there bloggers! I've let my blog go quiet whilst I try and redesign it to be more in line with my "big idea" as WordPress talk about when starting up a blog. I've chosen Pilcrow as the best compromise between appearance and functionality for my baking/food blog. I've a custom header ready I've designed myself ready but not yet published and I've tweaked the layout to have a cleaner feel by only having a single columnar a footer at the bottom of my 5 most recent posts with my Facebook page link, email sign up widget and blog roll in. However, I'm really unhappy with the dark and blocky look of the footer and can't seem to manipulate it to anything better with the free theme as it stands. Do I have to buy the custom design upgrade to do this? I'm considering that so I can change the fonts too as they are too "business like" for my light hearted blog but I want to be sure before I commit to buy.

   Any advice, tips, hints, suggestions and critiques will be much appreciated! Mwah xx

   The blog I need help with is joblogsjobakes.wordpress.com.

2. timethief
   Member
   Feb 8, 2012, 9:20 PM

   However, I'm really unhappy with the dark and blocky look of the footer and can't seem to manipulate it to anything better with the free theme as it stands. Do I have to buy the custom design upgrade to do this? I'm considering that so I can change the fonts too as they are too "business like" for my light hearted blog but I want to be sure before I commit to buy.

   We cannot ddit themes or templates and change functionality on WordPress.com blogs. We cannot make any "major" changes to appearance unless we purchase an annually renewable custom design upgrade and do the required CSS editing. There is a preview function so you can try before you buy. Please read this section first: Frequently Asked Questions

3. michiecat
   Staff
   Feb 9, 2012, 3:09 AM

   Hi jobakes,

   Yes, with the Custom Design upgrade, you can change the appearance of the footer with CSS. As for changing fonts, the Custom Design upgrade would also give you access to our Font Editor which provides you with a variety of fonts to choose from. More specifically, the Font Editor would let you choose up to three fonts for your blog: "Site Title", "Headings" (including the widget titles), and "Body Text".

   If you want more fine-grained control over your fonts, you could change them with CSS.

   I hope this helps, let us know if you have any more questions.

4. jobakes
   Member
   Feb 10, 2012, 3:06 PM

   Thank you both for your quick replies - they've been very helpful. I've been reading through the CSS tutorials linked to on the WordPress.com site and think I get it now. Michiecat - would changing the footer be by utilising "the box model" mentioned in the CSS beginners tutorial? As mentioned here - http://www.htmldog.com/guides/cssbeginner/margins/

   I'm very much a real beginner when it comes to this technical stuff! X

5. michiecat
   Staff
   Feb 10, 2012, 9:02 PM

   Hi jobakes,

   Yes, that's exactly what you'd be doing! You can adjust the margins, borders, and paddings for all elements related to the footer.

   Here is one example of what you can do with the footer (basically, I have removed the black background color, adjusted some margins and padding, and changed the color of text and links). If you want, you can paste it into the Custom CSS editor and then preview it to see how it works:

   <br /> #footer #colophon {<br /> background: none;<br /> color: #000;<br /> padding: 20px 0;<br /> }<br /> #footer-widget-area .widget-title {<br /> color: #000;<br /> margin: 0 0 10px;<br /> }<br /> #footer #colophon a {<br /> color: #1c9bdc;<br /> }<br /> #footer .widget ul {<br /> background: #f9f9f9;<br /> border-color: #ddd;<br /> }

   Hope this helps. As you move forward with CSS, you can post CSS-specific questions on our CSS Customization forum.

6. jobakes
   Member
   Feb 10, 2012, 10:19 PM

   Michiecat, thank you so much! Gosh I don't know how long it would have taken me to figure that footer out - you totally fixed it for me :D. I think I will save the settings and use them as they stand, thank you very much indeed. I'll keep the link for the CSS forum too - thanks so much! Xx

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