2010 Handicapping for the Aldous Family

This past Christmas season Kyle decided to do a spin off of Kory's sports handicapping blog and published a post of his own entitled "Handicapping Christmas in the Aldous Home". His blog soon snowballed and before we knew it we had several blog posts concerning Christmas handicaps in our home. I decided that I would do my own handicapping post only mine will be entitled "Handicapping for the year 2010 in the Aldous family."

Just like Kyle my plays will be labeled according to how strongly I feel about them:

5* It's a lock - 1* It could happen:

And following each pick, I will provide a brief analysis.

We will have at least one wedding (4*)
I'm feeling pretty good about this one. Kyle, Kory and Kourtney each brought home someone for the holidays. I'm hearing wedding bells, I'm just not sure how many.

Keith and I receive new names (Grandma and Grandpa) (5*)
There is nothing in the oven yet but Kailynn promised me that she would come home with a baby next Christmas even if she had to borrow one. What a wonderful Christmas present this would be to have a little red headed Cooper in our home.

Exxonmobil announces that they will move us all to Houston, Texas in the next 3-5 years (4*)
Lets start with what we know. First, Exxonmobil is sitting on a piece of property that the government has wanted to get their hands on for some time. This would mean $$$ for the company. Second, this would enable them to consolidate their engineering departments. Third, most of the company's refineries and headquarters happen to be on that side of the country. Fourth, this has been the rumor for the year.

More berries than last year (5*)

This is a given much to my dismay. Last year I canned over 100 pints of raspberry jam, juiced them, made fruit leather, salsa, pie, ice cream and more and I still have a freezer full of them. This was just the raspberries, we also have blackberries, blueberries and strawberries. I gave this a 5 because Keith worked very hard on his berries this summer, he pruned, fertilized, trellised and transplanted them. We now have about 400 ft. of raspberry and blackberries alone.

We will acquire more electronics and other stuff than in any other year (3*)

In the two months that Kyle has been home we have acquired more electronics (TV's, WII's, Camera's etc) than in any other year. So you might ask why I only gave this a 3, this would be because he will be up against his dad's goal of saving more this year than ever before.

We will have more Aldous children living at home than away (3*)

I give this a 3 due to 1. The economic and job market status of our Country, 2. The future personal decisions some of our children. As of right now we are split 3 home and 3 away. Kyle, Korinne and Kameron at home, Kailynn, Kory and Kourtney away. Here's what I am assured of: Kailynn will not come home. She and Dallas are happily married and working in Dallas. Here's what I'm not sure of: Kory, in Utah right now doing Independent Study classes at BYU. Could do his classes anywhere so he could come home live for free and finish classes and find a summer internship. The only thing stopping this from happening is Karlie. Only time will tell what happens here. Kourtney, she is doing an online class for event planning and is trying to get back into BYU. I'm pretty sure the only thing stopping her from staying at home is Josh. As with Kory only time will tell what happens here also. Kyle, presently at home but would love to leave "Funchester" only thing stopping him from leaving is finding a JOB! Korinne and Kameron don't really have a choice they are here until they finish school and that won't start to happen until next year.

So there you have it, my picks for the Aldous family in 2010. It will be an interesting year and I can't wait to see how each of these play out!