Laura's Star

Laura is awakened by her father with a kiss. She comes into the kitchen for breakfast in a good mood, but Tommy ate the last of her favourite cornflakes. Tommy flees from the kitchen because of Laura's fit of rage. Laura's father calms her down, but as she comes out of the kitchen, she slams the door on Tommy's head. What a scene!

A big dog is lying in front of the kiosk. Laura und Tommy do not dare pass it on the way to get ice cream. On the way home, they meet their mother, who bought new shoes. They find a little bag with powder in the shoe carton. "Sprinkle a pinch of 'magic powder' into each shoe and you will feel full of life and everyone will notice how firmly grounded and strong you are!" it says.

Tommy's ball rolls through the gate into the gutter of the street. Tommy follows hesitantly, because he is not allowed to leave the courtyard without Laura. He finds a wallet at the roadside. There is a lot of money in it. He shows it to Laura and his friends. The children are happy that they are "rich" now, but that night, Laura talks to her star.

Laura goes to bed. Mum has just turned off the light when Laura hears a noise. She calls her parents, but they do not find anything. Shortly thereafter, it happens again. Mama says it is only the wind, and Laura can go to sleep. Mama turns the light off again and closes the door. Laura is sceptical, but cannot say anything about it. Then Tommy comes in, "You were right. I heard something, too."

Grandma brought a new jumper with her. It is a wonderful blue jumper with a big green frog. Laura does not even want to take it off, but unfortunately, the boys at kindergarten tease her the next day: "That is a real baby's jumper. Are you going to the toddlers' group?" Laura is heart-stricken and never wants to put the jumper on again. But that proves to be difficult.

Laura, Tommy and Sophie are playing prince, knight and dragon in the yard. Harry shows up with his gang and says that everybody should come with them into the back corner of the yard. It is about a test of courage. The test of courage is supposed to work like this: Harry has three identical boxes. One contains a piece of candy, the second a rotten piece of wood and the third a fat earthworm.

A new girl from Russia joins Laura's kindergarten. She only speaks a little English. Since she lives on Laura's block, the teacher asks Laura to take care of Oksana. Laura is very excited: a new girl who can even dance ballet. Overflowing with curiosity, she makes a date to play with Oksana and forgets that she already had a date with Sophie.

Laura, Tommy, Max and Pauline are in the yard gathering chestnuts. They want to make something with them in kindergarten. Then there is some rustling in the leaves. Laura finds a hedgehog! Where did it come from? Does it live there somewhere around there? Maybe it is looking for a place to spend the winter, says Pauline. That is what hedgehogs do in the autumn!

Sophie is in hospital where her tonsils will be removed. Laura wants to visit her. Harry and his friends Fred and Anton strongly advise against it. They say that the doctors in hospital just keep people there, sometimes longer than three weeks! They know some people that it has happened to. Laura is unsettled at first and even her parents' soothing words do not improve things much.

There will be a play in the kindergarten, and they will perform it in front of all the parents. It is about a little shepherd boy who is shown the way by a star. And of course Laura will be the star. Who else!? The kindergarten teacher makes nametags for each role with a picture of the figure. Laura is shocked when Mrs. Federlein wants Pauline to play the star and Laura to play the witch.

Laura and Sophie, otherwise best friends, are having a fight. Sophie thinks that Laura never lets her finish talking. Laura dismisses the idea, of course. When Sophie accuses her of not being able to keep a secret and therefore not wanting to tell her where she found a new super hiding place, Laura wants to prove to her that she can be silent better than anyone else.

One of Mama's friends, Claudia, comes to visit with her baby. At dinner time, Laura has decided. She tells her parents that they should make another baby. When her parents laugh and refuse, Laura feels like she has to show what she is made of and help take care of the baby. Opportunity calls when Mama and Claudia go for a walk in the city. Laura and Tommy are babysitters for the afternoon!

Laura sees that a circus is coming while she is shopping with her father. Laura really wants to go. There is no chance to go to the circus that day, though, because her father has already spent all of the money for the day. So she and Sophie draw a wonderful circus picture in the courtyard with coloured chalk. Tommy is also nearby, but he is drawing his own picture.

Laura and Sophie are riding their bicycles around the yard with their new helmets on their heads. Then they find three boys, Max, Fabian and Paul. They have built a pyramid out of old tin cans that they fished out of recycling containers and are shooting a ball at it. That sounds like more fun than riding bikes. When they get to the boys, they let them play. Both girls shoot way off to the side.

Laura goes to a gymnastics course for the first time. She is really looking forward to it. But when she is supposed to climb over the wall bars, she is seized by fear and dizziness. Her wild love of exercise receives a sudden blow. She tells her best friend Sophie about it, who diagnoses it: "Clearly vertigo. Then you'll just have to play with me again instead of going to the course."

Laura's kindergarten teacher suggests that the children who have a pet could bring it and tell about it. Laura would like to have a pet to bring with her, so she claims to have one. That surprises even Sophie. Now Laura tries using all kinds of arguments to convince her parents. Their NO is absolutely clear.

It is May. The birds are singing beautifully and new buds and leaves are everywhere. In kindergarten, the kids want to make a "spring jar". They are supposed to get together in pairs and see what they can find in the garden. Laura is clueless. Where is Sophie? Her best friend is not there yet! But she will come!

Laura and Sophie find a great cave in the courtyard. But when they want to enter in the afternoon, it is already occupied! A sobbing Harry is sitting there. He just cries and calls, "Just get out of here now! Otherwise my parents will find out that I'm here, and they won't have to look for me anymore, and then maybe they'll never get along again!"

Summer vacation has just begun. It will be a while, before they leave on their vacation. So Papa gave his children a plastic wading pool. The kids are thrilled. When it's full of water and they're splashing around magnificently, Tommy thinks that they could dive for treasure. He quickly grabs a pretty shard of pottery and throws it into the pool. Laura doesn't like the idea and with good reason.

Laura is practicing her recorder. Always the same part. Her mother praises her, "That already sounds very nice." Laura thinks so, too, so she registered to perform the next day in the auditorium of the music school. "Good, then you should practice the whole piece," says her mother. And she tells Laura how she used to practice as a child before a performance.

The weather outside is horrible and rainy. Grandma is visiting Laura, and is doing crossword puzzles with the kids. Then Tommy realizes that a certain puzzle is a special one. Grandma explains that it is a competition. If you complete the puzzle properly and send the correct solution on a card to the publishing house, you can win a trip to Africa. AFRICA! Laura starts dreaming immediately.

Tomorrow is Halloween. All of the children are picking their monster costumes. Laura has a wonderful witch costume that really scares Tommy. As she meets Sophie in the yard, the other kids are just making fun of somebody who bought a toadstool at the store. Who's afraid of a toadstool? Everyone laughs, but Sophie is sad. Only Laura finds out why: her mother bought the costume for her.