Customize StudioPress Lifestyle Pro

This is my first time on the forum and as way of introduction – I know just enough to get me in trouble!

My site is amberlynnbenton.com. It is a new website for me where I will be moving over some content from an old blog. I will be creating pages to feature a portfolio of my illustration and surface patern design, but I also want to customize my website to reflect my style and instantly showcase some of my work.

When I first began the project I was customizing the .css stylesheet in the wordpress editor. I was liking where it was going, but I broke it (of course I had neglected a back up) and because I wasn’t sure what I broke I uninstalled and reinstalled my theme. I’m using Genesis with LifeStylePro running as a child theme.

I have installed FireFox and FireBug to help me see what my elements are and what .css is affecting them. I have also installed a plugin for Genesis which allows me to use hooks although honestly this is vague for me right now. I think I can put custom html in those instead of directly editing the .css? This pretty much emcompasses my skillset. Since the reinstall I have reinstalled my background image and customized my color theme again.

Per my background image – I am having one issue. When it tiles I can see the line where it tiles – maybe it’s a one pixel border somewhere? In illustrator my file tiles perfectly with no seam so I don’t think it is a problem with the image itself, but rather in how it is displayed. To disguise this funtil I can fix it I have installed a larger scale of the pattern so there are fewer seams.

My main goal right now, though is to customize the header. I have another pattern that I am setting to repeat as a background in my header. Overtop of that I want to install a custom logo (one that is larger than the one allowed in my theme). When I broke it I was using the following edits to my .css :

.site-header {
	background-color:;
	padding: 48px;
	overflow: hidden;
	background-image:url("https://www.amberlynnbenton.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/overthegardenwall.png");
	background-repeat: repeat;
	background-position:center;
	height: 300px;
	margin: -20px -20px -10px;
}

.site-header h1.site-title a {
display: none;

I didn’t make all of these changes at once. I began by changing the size and margins of the header until I had something that I liked and then I put in the background image. To hide the site title I set the display to none, but of course it still displayed on all of the other pages of the site so that probably isn’t the best way to fix it.

I have since read that I should be using background-repeat: x rather than background-repeat: repeat. Is this correct?

At some point I broke the navigation menu so that rather than displaying as a tabbed navigation bar it reverted to an unordered list. I couldn’t figure out what I broke thus the reinstall.

To summarize I want to customize the header size and margins, install a repeating background image in the header, and install a custom sized logo over this header image.

Is this something that I can do using the Genesis hooks plugin or will I have to do it directily in the .css editor?

What are the issues see in the edits that I made to the .site-header .css?

What might be the issue with being able to see the repeat in my background image?

Thanks!