That's the beauty of these boats talbot: they are so easy to rig "just the way you want it". And as Chris points out, so easy to "MacGyver" as necessary, even while underway. Just keep a small selection of extra line/hardware onboard, and you can pretty much knock together anything you want/need ...
One option you have is to add one thing at a time back to the setup, let your wife/crew learn/get used to that, then add the next thing. Might reduce the "kaleidoscope" effect you describe. For many of us, we learned how to use these additional features as we went along/added them, slowly and over time. Totally understandable, the "brain-overload" of new crew facing it all for the first time.
Before Ella's arrival, when my "First Mate" (wife) would come along with me, I would let her helm as well as crew. She pretty much "got it", but I would only give her one specific job/line to handle at a time. In fact, she was aboard the time the shroud departed, the incident that ultimately resulted in the addition of the mast hinge, and she was keeping her cool, like that was a normal thing! She was really catching on, but now with Ella, when she goes, Ella goes, and vice-versa, so I make sure we go out in conditions where I can do everything, and they can just enjoy themselves ...
I believe that storm tri-sail thingy is for use at anchor, and I'm seriously considering making one, since I plan to do more overnighters to include anchoring out. Need to do a bit more research tho. Sailrite has some options here, but they seem to be for much bigger boats:
http://search.sailrite.com/?freeText=an ... hor%20sail