Video editing software (for a novice), any advice?

[mike boss]

Not coin op related, but I know some people here are very talented and well rounded.
Wife picked up a new camcorder to track the growth of little Sophia Rose (or daughter).
In the past I've found that camcorders often run their course rather quick.
I think part of it is the footage is just raw and loses appeal.
I'm looking for some good software to edit home movies, but has to be wife proof.

Any advice ?

[nullPointer]

Depends on your OS of choice natch, but believe it or not I've found plain ol' Windows Movie Maker to be very satisfactory for the purposes of editing home movies.  Being that it's Microsoft, Movie Maker is aimed squarely at the general populace.  As a result it doesn't have a plethora of advanced technical features and settings, but that also generally translates as passing the WAF (Wife Acceptance Factor).  Plus it's free, so yay for that. 

[drventure]

Second on Movie Maker, not as feature rich as some paid apps, but it works, and can do a decent job, and it's free with windows!

[mike boss]

Cool, thanks guys.

I think I'd just like to create menus and punch up footage.
You know, Sophia's 1st B-Day made a lil more special ! lol

I'll need to shoot something quick and play around with it.
See how long the import times are, etc.

Camera has two modes, something HD and MP4. But I know in HD the 4GB card it came with only gets like 100 minutes.
Picked up another 32GB to go with it.