Hello and welcome :) you can find some instruction on how everything works on the pinned threads in the "free talk" section. The ways to earn gold coins are plenty: post a new thread (such as this one); comment to other threads or posted photos/patterns; complete tasks in the "My center section">Tasks; as rewards for bounties (big rewards in hope to find a specific pattern: if you upload the one sought after, you can redeem the bounty) and others... When you have enough coins, you can browse the library of the site and download whatever you like, its cost deducted from your owned coins :) feel free to share patterns you own, if they are not already uploaded!
Hope you'll enjoy it here and happy crafting :)
Every time you post, you get gold coins. When you have enough gold coins, you can start downloading patterns. For example, a pattern might cost 150 coins. When you have 150 coins, you can click on the "rar'" file under the pattern picture and it should download. So, if you have 300 coins saved up, it'll go down to 150.