How to connect 35-40 white colour LED's to 12V, 7Ah Battery

I am a newbie to this forum. I know to assemble circuits by referring to circuit diagrams. a commerce graduate with very basic theoretical knowledge of electronics . That's me.

I want to light up my house (3 rooms + 2 halls + kitchen + some exterior area) using 35-40 LED's when the power fails. I'll do the switching of the circuit manually (to begin with) but can someone help me with how to wire the LED's. (Parallel or serial, with / without resistors, I don't know what's best) I can certainly assemble / wire them up if someone can show me circuit.

I have a 12V 7Ah battery to light up the LED's. Can someone help me ?

 

Hi Steve,

I did notice it and thanks for your reply as well.

The link to the wizard at http://led.linear1.org/led.wiz was helpful

Just a thought. Wouldn't the 7Ah do any harm to the LED's ?

 

Hi Steve

Good one. I liked your analogy of comparing 7Ah to a big fuel tank

Now this one is a manually operated circuit, Isn't it ?

To take it a step further - How would i modify the circuit to switch on automatically when the power fails ?