After crashing my site jamesriverjournal.com/ trying to migrate to Joomla 2.5, I am now installing a whole new version of Joomla 2.5 on a different server, www.jamesriverjournal.net/ so everything is clean. I checked out K2 and it looked like just what we need. It is. But I couldn't get the articles to load onto the front page, and spent several frustrated hours on this forum searching for the answer. I knew the answer would be simple. It was.

Go to module manager, open K2 content. Make sure the module is published. Give the module a position. Select the K2 category you want to show. (You can duplicate the module for other categories) Give the module a menu assignment. (I chose "only on pages selected" and them "home") Save it and you are good.

I know I am not the only one who could not figure this out right away.
Thanks for letting me post.