Mark is growing up and there are the inevitable mother-son conflicts. Dana gets all excited when Cody says he can get her a date with Brad Pitt, and J.T. becomes very protective of Al when his friend wants to take her on a drive-in date.

Al, Dana, and Karen realize that they must set aside petty differences and work together to babysit Lilly.

Cody thinks that the new neighbour is a jewel thief from New York. Dana moves into a college dorm and Carol seems to be the only one who misses her. Karen and Al visit her a week later and are shocked at the change in her.

Cody gets Lilly to sleep when Carol is unable to do so, which makes Carol think she hates her. Dana is forced to work with JT at a family helpline by their psychology professor, much to her chagrin. A potential suicide shakes them up.

Cody proudly announces he got a back-breaking 'dream job', as 'stagehound' (roadie) for Mark's idol, rock band singer Christi Rose and Petal to the Metal, and gets the geeky kid to meet her backstage. Impressed with kind, cool Cody's way to handle fans, Christi asks him as her personal body-guard. Meanwhile, the four eldest kids' constant begging and fighting for the family car convinces Carol and Frank to buy another car for them. The kids' enthusiasm over Frank's car choice, a Mustang convertible, cools when it seems to be his baby, rather too precious to be left in their hands... Fleeing a horde of pushy fans in Cody's arms and on his Harley, Christy stays the night as his guest in the Lambert house and asks him to come along on her six months tour...

Cody joins Dana's feminist group, over her misgivings. They are to have a meeting but there is competition from a toga party. Frank and Carol have a spa night together. Mark is flying solo to the school dance and ends up on the wall.

Dana was eager to see 'the Amazing Codini' perform, but realizes too late he takes her into the magic box, hasn't fixed the necessary link to get out again and has no back-up plan, even knocks it over- they are trapped indefinitely, to her absolute horror, while he enjoys the closeness; yet salvation is within reach all the time... Meanwhile Carol dragged Frank to a beauty convention (a fake temperature doesn't fool experienced parents), then told him to entertain himself as she couldn't interest him in the least, only to finds Frank enjoying a female participator's manual hair-care too much... Reading about a cash price for the baby chosen at a Yum-Yum baby-food commercial audition, Lilly's babysitters J.T. and Al dashed off thereto but are too excited. When their parents return, Lilly has been switched with a baby-boy...

Cody manages to electrocute himself adding Christmas lights to his van. JT works part-time selling Christmas trees and gets a lesson in the true meaning of Christmas by a co-worker. Frank sets Al up with the son of an old family friend.

Frank is caught in the middle of a dispute between Carol and his well-meaning but overbearing mother, Helen, over the rearing of baby Lily. He wants to stay out of the argument, but realizes his marriage is more important when Helen announces plans to move to Port Washington to be Lily's nanny.

When Cody is wearing his cheese-head he guesses the lotto numbers. Mark and Karen try to take advantage of it. Dana has a new boyfriend who believes in honesty, which irritates everybody. JT pretends to be Lilly's father to pick-up a girl.

Frank's mother comes to town and offers to take the whole family to Disney world for a week. JT tries to impress some girls by spending big. Mark tries to organise a Disney world record. The girls decide to enter a talent contest.

The talent quest goes to Karen's head and she dispenses with Dana and Al. JT and Rich fall out over JT's big spending. With Mark's assistance, Flash continues to chase the park record.