I’m working on releasing new documentation and a widget uploader that will automatically upload all the demo content to your homepage for you. The Docs will show up in a brand new section of the site to organize everything and make the whole process easier. That will be here soon.
Also, since the default Genesis Featured Posts widget doesn’t come with the option for columns, I’ve been using this plugin to handle it – https://github.com/calliaweb/featured-custom-post-type-widget-for-genesis which adds the option to have columns (and a few other features). The direct download is here – https://github.com/calliaweb/featured-custom-post-type-widget-for-genesis/archive/master.zip
You can upload that zip file to your Plugins directory just like a normal plugin. A lot of other Genesis Devs have been using this type of plugin. It’s pretty cool.
Let me know if you get everything working.