It’s officially countdown time. One week from Wednesday our team of students, doctors, teachers, advocates, and lay people will meet up in Chicago and get on a plane for a very long time. We will have one full day in Beijing and then a travel day to Xian before we drive another few hours by van to the city where we are serving. On Monday the 23rd, we will load into a white van with a driver who can only say “Hello? Hello? Hello? Howareyou?” in English. We’ll wind through busy streets where Mercedes drive beside old bikes pulling trailers of vegetables we don’t recognize, all of them honking at each other to make themselves known. We’ll take deep breaths as we pull up to a big accordion gate where we will be waved through. And, there we will start Day 1 at the orphanage.

We’re almost there.

There will be 15 of us in that van behind our driver friend wearing OH HAPPY DAY shirts. But, our team is so many more than that. There are literally hundreds of people a part of this team–financial donors, doll makers, art supply buyers, parents who sent pictures of their children to show the staff who cared for them, children who participated in sticker drives so that we could cover little fingers and hands with kitty cats and smiley faces, women who donated hand scrubs and instadry nail polishes. The 15 in that van are just the ones who actually get to GO.

As we enter into those gates on Monday the 24th, we want to do it as a Team with a capital T not just as our little team. We’re setting something up so that we can do that–something we have declared OH HAPPY DAY Day.

On Monday the 24th, our team will be donning our blue OH HAPPY DAY shirts as we go. We’re asking that you join us in your OH HAPPY DAY shirt. Think of us, pray for us, be one of us as you wear it. Maybe even share a selfie with #ohhappyday to give us that reminder that you’re with us as we go. We’ll be hopping online as a team looking for those pics to encourage us at the end of our first day. We’d love to see yours among them.

Need a shirt still? Order yours HERE, making sure to give us your first and second choice of colors since we’re getting a bit low in stock.

Want another way to come with us? Sign up to pray for us HERE. We’ll send out some prompts this week to get you started. Want to go even deeper? Order a guided prayer kit that will guide you through 5 different activities to help you engage with God in creative ways specifically focusing on the needs of China’s orphans.