Wells,

Thank you for your concern for my well being.  You are correct I wouldn't want my head to explode!  This is perfect! 

I already bought the Dummies book (no offense taken) and you are corerct, the do a great job at explaining dnn.  Much better for noobies than than the Professional DotNetNuke 4 (Wrox).  I will check out the skinning book today.

I will also try reverse engineering the default skin.

Is there a place online you would recommend for me to get skinning help?

Again,

Thank you

My first few skins, I didn't even know about the XML file, and didn't have any problems, however you're limited to the default settings of the skin objects. As far as online resources for skinning, DNNCreative has been an invaluable resource for myself. They have many video tutorials dealing with a wide variety of DNN solutions, and a great one on CSS Skinning. There is a subscription fee, but it is money well spent in my opinion. Another site I use frequently, especially when setting up my XML files is: http://www.thinkofdesign.com/resources/dotnetnuke-skinning-reference/ .