File this under the category of life can change on a dime.

So my wife's father just recieved a diagnosis for a terminal illness. The doctors say he will live about 3 years on average. My wife is an only child so she will be the only one that will be able to provide care for him. Additionally, I have two kids and one of them requires my wife to be home. Currently I have a job where I travel so when my father in law requires my wife to provide care for him I will be required to be at home taking care of my child.

With all of that said I'm looking for an employment solution where I can telecommute and earn a living while working out of my house. I have an engineering degree and I have done some programming but it's so long ago (15yrs) it's not relevent for today and I have not programmed since then. So essentially I would be starting from scratch but I do have about a year to get up to speed.

are there very many job opportunities where I could work from home as a java programmer and make $80,000/year as a beginning programmer?