I enjoyed this thread.

I have a tandem bike that has less than 50 miles on it and that is over a 33 year period of marriage. I could have been way more tactful and supportive apparently in those 50 miles. so it hangs in the closet.

For what it is worth, I will share my wife's unhappy two experiences so far with kayaks. We went to a CLC demo day and she enjoyed paddling. I was thrilled. However, the boat she was in was a large volume boat and she was 5'1".
The guy sending people off was tired and did not help us set up the foot pegs, as she tried to get out on the shore after our enjoyable paddle, she pulled a muscle in her chest and that was not a positive experience, painful in more than one way.

Years later she agreed to take a beginners class at a symposium in San Diego. Since she is not a morning person I signed her up for an afternoon class. She was in a borrowed boat which was again too large for her and when the winds came up, she had a difficult time.

So: TAKE SOME TIME AND TRY TO FIND SOME WAY TO TEST DRIVE SOME DIFFERENT BOATS. If you feel you really want to build something, consider a SOF, much easier to build in my opinion ( I have build two in class situations and have still not finished the CLC stitch and glue kit despite starting it first. If you go the SOF route you can build the frame and do the saran wrap test, if the boat is not what you want you can rebuild the frame and test again. Much easier than dealing with wood and fiberglass remodeling.) Also cheaper overall and much easier to handle off the water weight wise.

I am going to try getting my wife into one of the SOF boats and hope the third try will do the charm. Good luck and I hope you have lots of hours enjoying paddling together. Think of me