category box, etc placement is interfering with logo

I have been trying to figure this problem out for a couple days but cannot find a solution, so I am asking for help. I am very new using ZenCart but I think I have the custom folders set up correctly. I am not well versed on css.

Is this a style sheet issue? or is there a setting under the configuration tab that I am missing? or something else? I have set the logo size

Also, I am trying to add a background image instead of a solid color on the sides of the "store front". I attempted to just change the color from the light blue in my custom css file, but no matter what I changed the hex number to, the light blue never changed. This is what I have in my custom style sheet now:

body {
margin: 0;
font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;
font-size: 62.5%;
color: #000000;
background-color: #000000;/black/
}

The path I am using is: \includes\templates\CUSTOM\css\stylesheet.css

Is this correct?

Now I am finding that any little change I make to the style sheet (even just the number of px in the height of the logo wrapper) causes my site to look like this:

Thank you in advance for your help. I hope this doesn't sound too stupid... I have no programming backgound, just the desire to learn and an unbounding stubborness to succeed.

I'm taking a gander at this and guess what I see when I go to store.omahamachinequilting.net/?

Index of /

  Name                    Last modified      Size  Description
  store/                  23-Jun-2008 05:24    -   

Let's take a look at your stylesheet.php first then we will change your /catalog/includes/configure.php and /admin/includes/configure.php

Are you using store.domain or Domain for your referenced site?

Site Looks great in Mac Safari and Firefox. No crowding issues. You must have corrected it already.

I havn't made any changes as of my original post. Like I said: I have no real programming experience and you will need to be pretty detailed in your comments or I will be completely lost! Thanks for taking a look.

I am using store.domain

Are you using windows?

Download Safari, Firefox, Opera, and IE7 if you have not already.

View your site in each. Be sure to empty the cache so you see the new site.

Looking at your original site. All of it can be included in your Zen Cart via the EZ Pages.

We'll talk about that after the crowding issue at hand. Then you can use just omahamachinequilting.net and not store.omahamachinequilting.net.

Let me know how this works out.

Yes, I am using windows (vista...ughhhhh)... my browser is IE7. I did download firefox, et al, deleted the cache, and the site looks fine there like you said. So most people use IE, right? How do I trouble shoot this?

My SSL cert is issued for the subdomain. The omahamachinequilting.net domain is set up for information about my quilting service. i want to link the zencart to that site for my customer convenience and wanted the SSL so they can purchase fabric online. Am I completely off base in wanting to separate but link the two sites? This has been a great learning experience and I am anxious to get my cart online. I appreciate you taking the time to help me out.

Yes. The majority do use IE7. It is good to see how your site looks in other browsers because, if you limit your History preference to 0 or 1 day then your cache will be fresh each time you open a new browser.

Do you have the SSL Logo some where so I can that it works?

I tried https://www.store.omahamachinequilting.net and https://store.omahamachinequilting.net

About the header logo.

Copy a section off either side of the logo image and use for a background for the logo.gif. Don't crop it. It would help if the image can perfectly repeat and create the pattern of the logo.gif rather than using just plain olive. See?

Again Stylesheet.css (same place)

body
{
color: #006;
background-color: #003;
background-image: url(../css/steel37.gif);
font-family: Arial,Times,Monoco,Helvetica,Serif;
font-size: 14px;
min-height: 600px;
}

This site's background contains blues to pretty much match the glassy header logo.

The background color loads first until the images can load and no matter how wide the window gets there will be no blank white space around the header logo.

Example: My business site is American-RC.com

Thanks again for taking a look at my problem. I do not have the ssl logo uploaded yet (haven't figured that one out yet either) but I do have the script. I'm not sure where to put it.

Try this url:
http://www.store.omahamachinequilting.net/store/index.php?main_page=

the ssl (https://) only shows up on the login pages and the check out pages. I did purchase the ZenCart manual online and set it up the way they recommended in the manual (I think ;)

I will try your recommendation on the stylesheet edit later today when I can sit down and concentrate on what I am doing and let you know how it goes. I am absolutely certain that my problem is mostly the fact that I am just not well versed on stylesheets. I bought a "CSS Web Design for Dummies" book and that is helping me alot with understanding how the stylesheet works and why it works the way it does. I made a few changes yesterday and now am at the "second problem" stage where everything shifts to the left in IE7 as you can see from the url above. I don't like this look and want it all centered with a background image on the sides but I think it is going to take awhile for me to work through this since I am so inexperienced. I plan to spend much of this weekend working on it.

Something that is going to cause you no end of grief is that you have four extra copies of your main stylesheet in your template's /css/ folder. All of the extras will load after the original stylesheet and override any changes you make there.

Delete them, or rename them like stylesheet1.txt if they have info you really want to keep.

A number of your elements are styled multiple times in conflicting ways (like #mainWrapper, #logoWrapper). Only the last one will generally be effective, but the others will make things confusing for you and for anyone trying to help.
A float: left; will negate a margin: auto; and keep the element from centering.

Thanks! I am just at that part in the "Dummies" book about how browsers look at stylesheets, etc and how the cascading, inheritance, and specificity dictate how an element is displayed. I had all those different versions out there thinking that I would make one change at a time and see if it works, then make another change, etc.... but was not "smart" enough to change the file extension. That little piece of advice was one of those: "Oh, Yeah!!" moments! Thanks for pointing out the obvious, I appreciate it.

Sounds good Rebecca. Also, another good book is Eric Meyer's CSS4. You can go on for years learning and modifying your site with cool CSS tricks.

GJH42 has some very good points.