I finally got time this weekend to try to fix up some things that have been bugging me on my blog. I was stumped about how to create blog menus in WordPress, as well as how to use categories to feed posts to specific pages. So once I figured it out, I decided to document it here and share in case it can help anyone else with the same problem.
I also had an issue with my default posts not showing up correctly on my home page. Only the 2 latest posts would ever appear, regardless of the number of posts settings I had saved. The solution for that specific issue is at the end of this post.
I am on WordPress.com so these tips would be applicable to that platform specifically.
I figured out how to create a new page and feed certain posts to it. This one was tricky and took ALOT of Googling to figure out, and even more trial-and-error. But I finally made it work using Categories.
If you’re a newbie like me, then Categories can be difficult to figure out. There are basically 3 locations you need to make Categories feed certain posts to a specific page. All 3 locations are in your WordPress Dashboard. You can access your Dashboard by going to “My Site” > “WP Admin”.
Once you are in your Dashboard…
- Dashboard > Posts > Categories
- This is where you create your Category and describe it
- Dashboard > Pages
- This is where you create your new Page
- I used “Use Blank Layout” for mine and it worked ok
- If you’d like to Copy an existing Page, be sure to use the “Copy” link available
- Dashboard > Appearance > Menus
- This is where you assign a Category to a Page, so that certain posts (labelled with that specific Category) will automatically feed to that Page.
- You use the “Add Menu Item” section, and double-check that when your Page gets added to the “Menu Structure” section, that it is labelled as “Category” instead of “Page”.
I have a sneaking suspicion that different templates can react differently to this, so just keep double-checking on your live site that you’re happy with it.
One problem I ran into that took an extreme amount of Googling to resolve, was my issue with my Home page not displaying more than 2 of my latest posts, despite all my settings everywhere setting it to 10 posts per page.
The solution was a weird one, but it worked! So I’m sharing it here as well in case anyone else is having a similar problem.
- Dashboard > Appearance > Menus
- In the “Add Menu Items” section, you will expand the option for “Custom Links”
- Enter “/” (right slash) into the “URL” field
- Enter “Home” into the “Link Text” field
- Select the “Add to Menu” button
- You will notice that a new “Home” item appear in the “Menu Structure” section with “Custom Link” as it’s type. Drag it to the correct order where you’d like it.
- Then, in the same “Menu Structure” section, and you will remove the original “Home” item that appears there as a “Page”.
