hello again,

more specifics on exactly what i am trying to do.

i have 300 rows (record entries) containing people's names. These folks
over the next 12 months are going to be going in a variety of locations.

I have a large amount of columns set up as dates.

I am going to limit the data entry into the date column/cell to the following:

DB, DN, DS, DO, DJ, HH, PCS, LV

As I am going to do a bunch of counting formulas for each day (so we can
figure out the number of folks in each location), so I need to make the text
entry into each cell.

What I do not know how to do (since conditional formating only allows 3
conditions)...is this:

In a cell, I enter "DB". This entry triggers the cell to fill with a
certain color shade, as well as change the entered text to the same color.

Here is the color scheme that I would like to use:

DB (gray 40%), DN (bright green), DS (sea green), DO (turqoise), DJ
(red), HH (yellow), PCS (red), LV (black).

appreciate any help that anyone can provide!!! thanks in advance :))