Honestly, HTML may not be a bad idea for a total beginner. It's not a programming language, but it allows you to introduce a number of ideas that are the building blocks of programming- the distinction between 'code' and rendered output, nesting, quotations and escapes...
She is just being nice to me...but she is also investing in our 'couple time' together. The way I pitched it is, "something for us to do together". She loves that idea.