Loading Widgets Via Child Theme

Question

I'm using the very popular Elementor theme to build my WordPress site, but unfortunately there is not a Widgets option when I go to Appearance in the Dashboard:

I need it in order to create a sidebar.

So this has caused me to install a Child Theme, so that I can add some code to functions.php in order to get the widgets option to show.

This is what I have in my functions.php file for the child theme:

<?php
add_action( 'wp_enqueue_scripts', 'enqueue_parent_styles' );

function enqueue_parent_styles() {
   wp_enqueue_style( 'parent-style', get_template_directory_uri().'/style.css' );
}

add_action('widgets_init', 'outWidgetsInit');

function ourWidgetsInit() {
    register_sidebar( array (
        'name' => 'Sidebar',
        'id' => 'sidebar1',
    ));
}

And this is causing errors to show at the top of the theme while developing:

Why is the code showing at the top of the screen? What should I do differently here?

Answer 1

For whatever reason, maybe it was caching-related, but waiting a day and then adding this code at the bottom of functions.php solved the issue:

if (function_exists("register_sidebar")) {
    register_sidebar();
}

According to this article - see the 'How do I add the Widgets menu option'

https://elementor.com/help/hello-theme-tips/

So then the full code for my functions.php file within the child theme is:

<?php
add_action( 'wp_enqueue_scripts', 'enqueue_parent_styles' );

function enqueue_parent_styles() {
   wp_enqueue_style( 'parent-style', get_template_directory_uri().'/style.css' );
}

add_action('widgets_init', 'outWidgetsInit');

function ourWidgetsInit() {
    register_sidebar( array (
        'name' => 'Sidebar',
        'id' => 'sidebar1',
    ));
}

if (function_exists("register_sidebar")) {
    register_sidebar();
}