Writing off small business startup cost on personal taxes?

[yp_joe_arlington_8]

I'm starting a small business w/ startup cost of about $10k. It's a home based operation operation under an LLC I formed. Lets say that THIS year I only make $2k w/ the short operation time, and NEXT YEAR I make $12k. Can I write off the $10k on my personal taxes for this year? How do you go about writing off start up expenses? I have a full-time job, I make about 45k a year. I want to know how much if any of the startup cost I can write off towards my income taxes. The business will be up and running in December, but not enough time for my revenue to exceed my startup cost. Next year I plan to turn a profit (obviously) given the full year of operation.

I'm not a tax whiz, please dumb it down.