To many of the Thursday night guests at First United Methodist Church in Oak Park, they are Mama and Papa Bear. Patti and Phil Sheehan take the nicknames as signs of love and respect, earned through the weekly volunteer shifts they've been doing for almost 20 years.

Indigo Smith got a front row seat in her preschool class Feb. 15, the day her dad was scheduled to read a book to the kids at West Suburban Temple Har Zion. Smith, 4, sat calmly on the rug as she and her classmates listened to her dad read one of her favorite stories, "Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed."

It was by all accounts an ambitious art project for Longfellow Elementary School, one that took four years, hundreds of Oak Park students and thousands of pounds of cement. But more than a decade later, the mosaic, which depicts the village's history dating back to the Stone Age, is sitting in one mom's basement, rather than being displayed in all of its splendor.