Title: Another irritating Child Theme problem
Last modified: August 24, 2016

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# Another irritating Child Theme problem

 *  Resolved [ohyung](https://wordpress.org/support/users/ohyung/)
 * (@ohyung)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/)
 * I’ve looked over 100 of these child theme problem forums and have done everything(
   I believe!) but to no avail. The message, like many, I get is:
 * The parent theme is missing. Please install the “gridsby;” parent theme.
 * Here is what I have as my style.css code:
 *     ```
       /*
       Theme Name: Gridsby Child Theme
       Theme URI: http://modernthemes.net/demo/gridsbywp
       Author: ModernThemes
       Author URI: http://modernthemes.net
       Description: Gridsby is a pinterest style gallery theme which is a simple way to showcase a beautiful photo collection. Gridsby is responsive and retina ready, and includes an easy method for posting photos to a front page gallery. You can check out the demo at http://modernthemes.net/demo/gridsbywp for a closer look.
       Version: 1.0.36
       License: GNU General Public License v2 or later
       License URI: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html
       Text Domain: gridsby
       Tags: black, white, light, gray, fluid-layout, responsive-layout, one-column, two-columns, three-columns, left-sidebar, right-sidebar, custom-background, custom-colors, custom-menu, featured-images, full-width-template, rtl-language-support, theme-options, translation-ready, photoblogging, front-page-post-form, post-formats
   
       Template: gridsby;
   
       */
   
       @import url('../gridsby/style.css');
       ```
   
 * my pathways are follows:
 * wp-content/themes/gridsby
    wp-content/themes/gridsby-child
 * I’ve done everything I can think of; double checked upper/lower casing, the gridsby
   theme is activated, tried it in sublime, textedit (made sure it was plain text
   and UTF-8). I installed gridsby on wordpress online and it works.
 * I’m losing my mind over this, any help is welcome!

Viewing 14 replies - 1 through 14 (of 14 total)

 *  [stephencottontail](https://wordpress.org/support/users/stephencottontail/)
 * (@stephencottontail)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6131885)
 * WordPress takes the `Template:` line quite literally. It must contain the name
   of the folder that contains the parent theme, and capitalization and punctuation
   matters. You need to remove the semicolon at the end; it isn’t necessary anyway,
   because it’s all considered part of the same comment block.
 *  Thread Starter [ohyung](https://wordpress.org/support/users/ohyung/)
 * (@ohyung)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6131931)
 * Ah, thank you, the semicolon was the problem. For some reason I thought it was
   a line of code 😛
 * It’s active, but it looks nothing like the actual website; the content is there
   but the style isn’t. It doesn’t seem like it’s importing the css properly???
 *  [stephencottontail](https://wordpress.org/support/users/stephencottontail/)
 * (@stephencottontail)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6131960)
 * Can you post a link to your site with the child theme active?
 *  Thread Starter [ohyung](https://wordpress.org/support/users/ohyung/)
 * (@ohyung)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6131961)
 * [http://robrusli.website/](http://robrusli.website/)
 * I just put some random posts up so I could see it with content, but you can contrast
   it with the [Gridsby Demo](http://modernthemes.net/demo/?theme=Gridsby)
 * thanks!
 *  [stephencottontail](https://wordpress.org/support/users/stephencottontail/)
 * (@stephencottontail)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6131969)
 * On your site, you’ve got curly quotes instead of straight quotes. You should 
   always use a plain-text editor like Notepad to edit your child theme’s files,
   not a word processor like Microsoft Word.
 *  Thread Starter [ohyung](https://wordpress.org/support/users/ohyung/)
 * (@ohyung)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6132015)
 * Sorry; I understand the need to use a plain-text editor to edit, but what do 
   you mean by curly quotes? Where?
 *  Thread Starter [ohyung](https://wordpress.org/support/users/ohyung/)
 * (@ohyung)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6132018)
 * Yeah also when I inspect elements on the page, there’s no CSS 🙁
 *  [Malachy](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mmcconnell/)
 * (@mmcconnell)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6132022)
 * Not all themes can be used for creating child themes. Some are design for it,
   some are designed to make it difficult.
 * Try copying the functions.php into your local directory and inspect the header.
   php file of the parent theme to see how it is handling the CSS.
 * Also if the parent theme uses CSS files other than styles.css then I think you
   need to copy them into your child theme too or use functions.php to include them(
   or hard code it).
 * Or just hack the Gridsby theme and don;t worry about updates. Well, you would
   manually add the theme updates.
 *  [stephencottontail](https://wordpress.org/support/users/stephencottontail/)
 * (@stephencottontail)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6132039)
 * I don’t recommend taking Malachy’s advice. It’s possible to create a child theme
   of Gridsby
 * In your child theme’s stylesheet, in the `@import` line, the quotes were appearing
   as curly quotes on the website itself. You need to make sure they are straight
   quotes.
 *  Thread Starter [ohyung](https://wordpress.org/support/users/ohyung/)
 * (@ohyung)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6132047)
 * Ah I see! For some reason texedit would curl them even with plaintext activated,
   but when I put it into textwrangler it stayed straight. I believe that fixed 
   it, thank you so much. I’m going to play around with it for a day or two and 
   make sure there are no other issues.
 *  Thread Starter [ohyung](https://wordpress.org/support/users/ohyung/)
 * (@ohyung)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6132052)
 * Hmm, okay, so when I click Custom CSS, Gridsby Theme Details, or Editor, the 
   following pops up:
 * Fatal error: Cannot redeclare gridsby_widgets_init() (previously declared in /
   home/robreorh/public_html/wp-content/themes/gridsby-child/functions.php:90) in/
   home/robreorh/public_html/wp-content/themes/gridsby/functions.php on line 113
 * any clue on what this means?
 *  Thread Starter [ohyung](https://wordpress.org/support/users/ohyung/)
 * (@ohyung)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6132058)
 * oh that’s weird, I removed the functions.php from the child theme and it’s okay
   again.
 *  [stephencottontail](https://wordpress.org/support/users/stephencottontail/)
 * (@stephencottontail)
 * [11 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6132060)
 * I’m glad to see that you’ve solved that issue. In the future, it isn’t necessary
   to copy the entire contents of the parent theme’s `functions.php` to your child
   theme’s `functions.php`, as WordPress automatically loads the parent theme’s `
   functions.php`. As you’ve seen, it can cause “Cannot redeclare…” errors.
 *  Thread Starter [ohyung](https://wordpress.org/support/users/ohyung/)
 * (@ohyung)
 * [10 years, 12 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6132154)
 * Everything has been fixed, thank you so much!

Viewing 14 replies - 1 through 14 (of 14 total)

The topic ‘Another irritating Child Theme problem’ is closed to new replies.

## Tags

 * [broken theme](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/broken-theme/)
 * [child](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/child/)
 * [child theme](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/child-theme/)
 * [parent](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/parent/)
 * [parent theme](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/parent-theme/)
 * [template](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/template/)

 * 14 replies
 * 3 participants
 * Last reply from: [ohyung](https://wordpress.org/support/users/ohyung/)
 * Last activity: [10 years, 12 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/another-irritating-child-theme-problem/#post-6132154)
 * Status: resolved

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