This year has been a real push forward year for us. A few months ago, I really started to have a sense of urgency for getting my children out of the public school system, especially my oldest. With the average age of first sexual encounters coming down and the increasing pull of the internet to pornography, I would like to pull him from an environment that encourages that as soon as possible.
We looked at our budget mid-summer to see if there was any way we could pull it off, my quitting immediately. While we are much closer than we've ever been, it was still impossible. We figured if we pushed really hard this year, maybe by next July (when our au pair leaves) we could make the switch.
I am the planner and number cruncher in our family so after discussing these ideas, I hit the spreadsheets to see if it could really work out. What I found was a little disheartening. While we would pay off a lot of debt this year, eliminating 4 loans, we would still be $1000 short per month. If it had been $250 - $300, I would have said, we can find some way to come up with that much money, but $1000 just makes it seem a little too far out of reach.
I quickly moved to other options. Maybe enrolling our kids in a private Christian school would help. I understand that we are all sinners, including our Christian raised kids, so kids at a Christian school have temptations too. At least at a Christian school, they would be taught the Word and encourage morals and values founded on the Word. We currently spend around $18,000/year on child care. Trying to include a Christian school for 3 of them would bump us up to about $30,000/year! That would really slow down the debt reduction!
When it comes right down to it, I am praying for a miracle. I'm not even sure what that miracle looks like right now, but somehow I feel like we need to keep shooting for next July. We are standing in faith for that which we cannot see.
Heb. 11:1 - Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
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