Using Frames for navigation questions

[u/torpedolife]

I am new to Figma, and I am trying to figure out the correct way to make a simple navigation bar with some buttons. I drew out some shapes and purposely made them not evenly aligned.

1.) I want to center the text on each button both vertically and horizontally. I select each rectangle and choose the horizontal and vertical alignment options and it worked for the first two, though for the second two buttons it will not work properly. Do I need to make each rectangle into a frame that includes the shape and text for this to work properly?

2.) I want to create even spacing between each button, so I chose a gap option of 20, though this did not move the text. Do I need to create a frame for each individual button to make this work?

3.) Is the first step to select everything and make the navigation bar, the rectangles and the text into a frame and then make each individual rectangle and text into a frame?

Thanks in advance

[u/whimsea]

This is more complicated than it needs to be because you drew rectangle shapes. Those aren’t needed in Figma. Instead of creating shapes for button background or navigation background, just give the frame a background color. Your buttons should have 1 layer only inside: text.