Five Mile Home Show Visitors Gawk - And Speak Their Minds Reactions Range From Laughter To ‘Marvelous’ To ‘Oh, Come On’

A dining-room ceiling mirror reflects the meals below, a bison head stares out over a big-screen TV set and bunnies cavort with lanterns and tree limbs along the stairway.

It’s $950,000 worth of view and design, the most expensive place in this year’s Showcase of Homes.

The show features seven residences that start at $265,000. That’s prohibitively expensive for most people walking through the hallways on plastic-covered carpets in bootee-covered shoes.

But that doesn’t keep visitors from speaking their minds.

“As a matter of fact, I go from room to room and burst out laughing,” said Molly Black, adding that she could never afford such grandeur. “It just gets better and better.”

This year’s home show is on the southern rim of Five Mile Prairie, just off Five Mile Road on West Lincoln. It’s hard to miss, with the subdivision jutting out of the prairie, the haze of dust from visitors’ cars and all the signs and vying open houses.

On Sunday, dads were admitted free for Father’s Day.

“It was marvelous, and the price was right,” said Mike Clarke, who toured the homes with his wife and son to cull ideas for their new home.

Their son Michael, 7, practiced household chores in a tent in which vendors showcased everything from hot tubs to dream closets to rug samples. Michael sucked up a pile of tiny socks with a high-powered vacuum as quick as an anteater would.

“I can use that to clean my room,” said Michael, who also thought it would be good if the vacuum sorted clothing from paper.

The homes, some of which haven’t been sold, attracted a steady stream of people Sunday. Attendance for the day was almost 3,000, about 1,200 of them fathers.

Craig and Kristin Busch welcomed visitors to their new home, estimated to have cost $265,000. They heard people say incredible things about their house. Then there was the man who suggested they move it to another lot with a better view.

“It’s a little nerve-racking to have all these people walk through your house,” Craig Busch admitted.

It’s a little nerve-racking to walk through the home about a block away that costs almost $1 million.

Molly Black and her sister walked through the upstairs hallway decorated with old windows with screens and broken panes. They detoured into a den made for the worldly, with globe lights, a map on the wall, an indoor putting set and a chess set. They wandered into a pillowed bedroom.

“Oh, come on,” Marcia BlackGallucci said. “We can’t take any more. Holy God.”

The spacious home was decorated by Design Works, a Spokane interior decorating company with a flair for the unusual. Whoever ponies up the money for the house probably will choose his or her own interior style.

It takes more than a few decorations, high wooden ceilings and a stamped concrete deck to impress the likes of Clayton Fosberg. When asked how much he’d pay for the home, the 6-year-old wrinkled his face and said, “Nothing.”

“Not even your rock collection?” his mother asked.

“No,” Clayton said. “I’m keeping my rocks.”

This home has its own rocks - big ones. Tahoe blend river rock lines the wall overlooking the fireplace, set in the middle of the spacious living room area.

Cher was on the big-screen television near the fireplace. A pool table was in the corner. Plants were everywhere. A rustic rocking chair with a straw hat and a duck decoy was perched on a ledge near the ceiling.

“It looks like you’ve stepped into a high-class bar,” Howard Stetson said.

Everyone’s a critic at a home show.

Most advocate high ceilings, spacious stairways and roomy bedrooms. They want big living rooms and fancy dining rooms, like in the most expensive home.

“I love this dining room,” said Margaret Fosberg, Clayton’s grandmother who’s visiting from Moscow, Idaho. “I could eat a hamburger in there and think I was eating a 10-ounce steak.”

And watch it disappear. Remember, that dining-room ceiling is a mirror.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 Color Photos

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: HOME SHOW The show runs through Sunday. Tickets cost $5, with children 12 and under admitted free. Hours are 3-9 p.m. weekdays, 10 a.m.-10:30 p.m. Saturday and noon-6 p.m. Sunday.