I have to second the sewing kit. I bought one of those little cheap ones with a bunch of different colored thread from King Soopers for like $4. I've been supplementing it with some up grades over time as well. A more extensive needle kit, a real (metal) thimble, the thread used for jeans (much stronger), better scissors. I keep the whole thing in a box that one of my old cell phones came in. It is small and fits in any drawer and stays neat and organized. I can't even count how many times I've used it. In fact, I just sewed the fly button back onto my favorite pair of pants yesterday. I have maybe $8 into the whole thing and have fixed all kinds of clothes (nearly every single one of my undershirts for example).

I just went online to www.expertvillage.com and taught myself how to do a few simple sewing things like 1) How to sew a button, 2) how to repair a tear, 3) how to sew two pieces of material together.

It looks like that window kit is probably a better idea than just buying a bunch of clear plastic and taping it to our window frame.