Maruko gets into a fight with her big sister over the tiniest little thing. Determined to make her sister eat her words somehow, Maruko begins plotting her revenge…

A male tutor is hired for Maruko’s older sister. Since Maruko has always wished she had an older brother, she’s absolutely thrilled. But the person who shows up is an oddly stiff and overly serious college student. Though disappointed, Maruko does her best to befriend him.

The moment Maruko’s family hears her teacher is coming for a home visit, the whole house erupts into chaos. A massive cleaning spree begins, though Maruko keeps doing the bare minimum. In the end, the teacher only chats briefly at the front door and leaves. Feeling cheeky, Maruko even sneaks a few bites of the snacks.

All the neighborhood kids are crazy about bicycles, but Maruko can’t ride one. Swept along by the encouragement of Tama-chan and the others, she finds herself forced into bicycle practice—falling over, getting scraped up, and giving up again and again…

Maruko wins a prize in an art contest and is set to receive an award certificate. Hoping to use this as leverage to wheedle a reward out of her parents, she makes her move—only for her sister to butt in and ruin everything. She pulls herself together and stands proudly on the awards stage, only to suddenly need the bathroom.

Maruko and her friends pick up a stray puppy. She begs her mother to let them keep it, but her plea is dismissed as just another one of “Maruko’s passing whims.” With no other choice, she asks around in class the next day for someone to adopt it, and class rep Maruo suggests the whole class raise it together.

Tomorrow is the school marathon. As Maruko trudges home with dread in every step, she finds her sister laid up in bed with a cold. Maruko, who wants nothing more than to avoid running, starts to wonder…

Hanawa-kun is going to appear on a televised children’s singing contest. The whole class is buzzing with excitement, and Maruko and her friends decide they ought to go cheer him on in person.

The next music class will have a recorder test. Since Maruko is terrible at the recorder, she decides to practice at home. In the middle of it, her father teases her, asking if she’s trying to sound like the noodle-cart flute. At first she gets mad, but before long she gets carried away and starts trying to play that very tune herself.

Bored stiff during spring vacation, Maruko decides to go visit her grandmother in Shizuoka. After somehow persuading the family, she sets off all by herself…

With spring vacation just around the corner, Maruko and her friends are all wondering about their report cards. When she hears that some kids get rewards from their parents for good grades, Maruko can’t help feeling envious. She decides she ought to ask for something too.

When Tama-chan says she saw the legendary snake-like creature known as the tsuchinoko, everyone accuses her of lying. Maruko dramatically defends her—“The tsuchinoko is real!”—and moves the class to tears. But in truth, all she really wants is the reward money promised for finding one. So she and Tama-chan set off in search of it.

Today is field trip day. Even while grumbling that mountain climbing is exhausting, Maruko heads off with the others. On the bus she loses at word-chain and is forced to sing a song, which makes her sulk even more. But once they arrive at the mountain, her spirits begin to lift after all.

Maruko is weirdly envious of a classmate who suddenly gets a nosebleed at school and becomes the center of attention. Being a healthy, energetic girl, Maruko herself has never had such a dramatic moment.

At the start of the new term, Maruo-kun enters the class representative race and is openly determined to beat Ebisu-kun. Meanwhile, Maruko is caught completely off guard when she’s unexpectedly nominated too.

Up until one minute earlier, Maruko’s day had been perfectly peaceful. Then her stomach suddenly starts hurting terribly. She tells the whole family, but no one believes her. Never has Maruko regretted her usual unserious face more than in that moment, as she struggles to make anyone understand just how much pain she’s in.

Ever since seeing baby Java sparrows at her grandmother’s house in Shizuoka, Maruko has been completely smitten. Normally she gives up on things quickly, but this time she tries every trick in the book and finally gets one. While training it to perch on her hand so she can show it off to her friends…

Maruko and Tama-chan are playing “ladies at tea” using her mother’s treasured opal ring. When her mother suddenly comes into the room, Maruko panics and hides the ring…

Mother’s Day is coming soon. Maruko wants to give her mom a present straight from the heart—but when she checks her piggy bank, she finds she only has 250 yen.

Tomorrow is the day parents come observe class. Unfortunately, the lesson is math—Maruko’s worst subject. Feeling sure she won’t shine at all, she tells her mother she doesn’t need to come.

For the school arts festival, Maruko’s class is putting on The Old Man with the Wen. Roles are assigned by lottery, and Maruko ends up cast as the neighboring old man.

Pen pals from faraway places are all the rage in Maruko’s class. Maruko decides she wants one too, and begins searching for a pen pal through a magazine.

Maruko is disappointed that her precious Sunday is ruined by rain. But the rain only gets heavier and heavier—until, unbelievably, a flood warning is issued for the whole town.

Tomorrow is the dreaded day of the school physical exam, which Maruko hates more than anything. Self-conscious about being short, she starts making utterly pointless efforts to grow even one extra centimeter.

Maruko wakes up unusually early, sneaks food from the kitchen, and nearly ends up late anyway. Because she wolfs down food and then sprints full speed to school, her stomach starts hurting once she gets there.

Tomorrow is the first day of swimming class. Even though she can’t swim 25 meters to save her life, Maruko makes a huge fuss over wanting a new school swimsuit and eyedrops and all sorts of other things…

Tomorrow is Tanabata. Maruko is determined to decorate bamboo branches and write her wishes on colorful strips of paper, and she becomes absolutely desperate to get hold of some bamboo before the day is over.

Fed up with the endless rainy season, Maruko is overjoyed when her mother buys her a brand-new umbrella that opens at the push of a button. But the very next day the weather turns beautifully sunny.

The first school term ends today, and summer vacation begins tomorrow. Maruko drags home all her school things in one enormous bundle. On the way home, beneath a tree, an old man is selling something rather mysterious.

Tomorrow is the school attendance day during summer break. Maruko, who has lately been sleeping until nearly noon, gets so worried about whether she’ll wake up on time that she can’t fall asleep at all…

Grandpa wins the top prize in a shopping district raffle. The prize is none other than “A Trip to a Southern Island.” By pure chance, no one else in the family can go, so lucky Maruko gets the spot. After a comical journey mixed in with a bunch of grown-ups, she finally arrives on the island.

Blue skies, wide seas, and Maruko is thrilled. She even becomes friends with Psady, and the week flies by in no time at all. After a sad farewell, Maruko returns to Japan and hands out souvenirs to the family…

Maruko goes with her father to the haunted house attraction on a department store rooftop, and she is so frightened her knees practically give out. She feels better once she gets home—but somehow it’s still a little embarrassing…

It’s August 31st, the very last day of summer vacation, and Maruko’s diary has been frozen in time since August 3rd. Worse still, her randoseru has been lying untouched since the closing ceremony of the first term. And inside it lurk still more undiscovered homework assignments…

After Tama-chan shows baby photos of herself at school, Maruko asks her mother to show her own baby pictures too. But the family album is full of adorable photos of her older sister, while Maruko’s own pictures seem to be mostly random afterthoughts. To cheer her up, her father takes her to a photo studio.

Maruko takes an interest in tropical fish. Since she can’t afford them herself, she asks her parents, only to be turned down immediately. Then her sister happens to get some from a friend. Delighted, Maruko thinks the tank looks lonely and starts adding marbles—and even a crayfish…

Maruko’s hair has gotten long, and her mother tells her it needs cutting. When her mother offers to do it herself, Maruko resists, remembering how badly it went the last time she cut Dad’s hair. But after finally giving in, she ends up with a blunt little bob that makes her look like Kintaro…

Dad, Maruko, and her sister set out on a hike in a manner that can only generously be called dashing. Dad, of course, has no stamina and keeps wanting to rest. On top of that, he merrily takes picture after picture of the children, convinced there’s film in the camera—only to realize much too late that there isn’t. And now he can’t bring himself to tell his daughters…

Maruko finds a white envelope in the closet. Assuming it must be someone’s secret stash, she decides she’ll return it personally and claim a ten-percent reward. But when no one can identify the owner, the family starts talking about splitting it among themselves—until her sister comes home. It turns out the money was actually her sister’s savings, entrusted to their mother.

The boys are obsessed with collectible cards that come as snacks prizes. But some of them get so carried away that they take the cards and throw away the snacks. When Maruko sees the boys doing this, she reports it to the teacher at the class meeting. Needless to say, the boys are not pleased, and before long the matter escalates into a boys-vs.-girls showdown after school on Mole Hill.

Tomorrow’s class meeting will include a seating shuffle. Maruko can’t bear the thought of being separated from Tama-chan. Since she has terrible luck with lotteries and absolutely does not want to end up grouped with Maruo-kun or Migawa-san, she decides to try a charm from one of her sister’s old spell books.

A signed bromide of Akira Nishikino arrives for Maruko’s sister from the fan club. Maruko secretly takes it to school—and promptly loses it. She searches frantically, but it’s nowhere to be found. Then, during Japanese class, it flutters right out from inside her textbook. Really, why does Akira Nishikino only appear when he’s least wanted?

Tomorrow’s science lesson is an experiment on convex lenses. The class has been told to bring glass bottles from home, and Maruko, hearing “bottle,” immediately thinks of juice. She tries to use this as an excuse to get her mother to buy some…

At school, Maruko hears that when Migawa-san wished on a shooting star, her wish actually came true. Maruko then spends ages agonizing over what she herself should wish for. Even after leaving the window open all night and giving her sister a cold, she still hasn’t learned her lesson…

Today is Shichi-Go-San, though Maruko had completely forgotten such a thing even existed as she slept late on a Sunday morning. Apparently her grandparents are coming from Kanagawa with her cousin Hiroaki all dressed up for the occasion. Maruko doesn’t usually get along with him, but as they spend time together she begins to see he has a rather sweet side after all.

When class jobs are assigned, Maruko chooses the animal-care role because it seems the least troublesome. But then it’s decided that from now on, the animal-care team will also have to look after the chicken coop. And so Maruko is immediately put to work tending the chickens…

That morning, for some reason, Maruko wakes up much earlier than usual. With a strange feeling in her chest, she goes to her parents’ room—only to find them in the middle of a serious argument. Maruko and her sister begin preparing themselves for the awful possibility of being separated.

Since her sister’s friend is coming over, Maruko is banned from entering their room. Suddenly desperate for a room of her own, she hears that Butaro uses the closet as a private hideout and decides to do the same. Grandpa finds out before the closet-room can be completed, so instead the two of them start building a room in the corner of the hallway…

Maruko’s family feels rather poor. Everyone somehow looks a little poor, too—and on top of that, they’re all complete goofballs. But more than any grand house, Maruko loves this family that may be poor but is healthy, cheerful, and always having fun together. And today, like any other day, slips by as lightly as the wind.

There’s only a little of the year left. Maruko decides to write New Year’s cards to all her friends, but things don’t go well using the ink and brush she borrowed from Grandpa. So she and Grandpa set out to make some rather unusual New Year’s cards instead…

It’s December 23rd, the day of the neighborhood Christmas party. The thoughtful idea seems to be that families should spend the real Christmas days, the 24th and 25th, quietly at home. But Maruko doesn’t think it sounds nearly worth missing her favorite TV shows for. Even so, once she goes and finds all the neighborhood kids gathered there, she ends up having quite a nice time…

Only one day remains in the year. The whole family is cleaning the house from top to bottom, though Maruko, Dad, and Grandpa mostly just pretend to clean while actually playing with the junk they find. Somehow the rooms finally get tidied up, and all that’s left is to listen for the temple bells ringing out the old year and welcome the new one.

The new year arrives, and with it the Sakura family’s traditional New Year gathering. The children happily play karuta and cards while the adults drink and launch into a proper feast. By the time the grown-ups are thoroughly tipsy and no longer making much sense, the party is finally over. Meanwhile, the children are already darkly checking their New Year’s gift-money charts to see how much more they can earn tomorrow…

Lately, Maruko has gone through night after night with bright, wide-awake eyes and no sleep at all. As a result she’s late to school, forgets her homework, and suffers all around. When Maruo-kun tells her that people die if they don’t sleep, she panics and sets out to find a sure-fire way to fall asleep…

At morning meeting, the teacher scolds the children for refusing to go outside and play in the cold. Maruo-kun, ever the class representative, proposes that everyone do vigorous dry-towel rubdowns during the morning meeting. To Maruko’s horror, the teacher praises the idea, and from the next day onward everyone has to do it…

A rare afternoon with no homework at last. Maruko is peacefully playing with dolls when her mother orders her to tidy a shelf. Standing on a chair to take down some old notebooks, she loses her balance and topples over in a heap. In the process she discovers the picture diary she kept in first grade—and is swept straight into a world of memories.

In honor of Setsubun, today’s craft project is making ogre masks. Maruko and the others start creating all sorts of masks with empty boxes and yarn. And when Migawa-san bursts into tears after one of Maruo-kun’s jokes hurts her feelings, Maruko somehow ends up deciding she’d make the perfect model for an ogre mask…

Maruko goes to the department store with Grandpa to buy American crackers. But in the thick crowds she gets separated and lost. Along the way she bumps into Maruo-kun, but being too proud to let him realize she’s lost, she parts ways with him and carries on alone…

Walking home with Tama-chan, Maruko finds a balloon with a note attached. She immediately decides to write back. Then, to meet the person who sent the note, the two girls wait nervously at a bus stop. A bus approaches with a low rumble of its engine. What sort of boy will step off it…?

Influenza is sweeping the country, and many elementary and middle schools in Shimizu have already had to shut down classes. Maruko’s sister’s class is one of them. While her sister gets to stay home perfectly legitimately without even being sick, Maruko oversleeps and runs madly off to school. But what will happen to Maruko’s class?

Hinamatsuri is just around the corner. As Maruko and Tama-chan excitedly chatter about hina dolls, Migawa-san comes up to them. Clearly she’s about to show off her own extravagant doll display—but bracing themselves and bringing Hamaji along for moral support, the three head to her house. What fate awaits them there…?

Maruko asks her mother how she and Dad first met, and why she decided to marry him. It seems they were introduced by one of Mom’s friends—but at the time, Mom still hadn’t recovered from heartbreak and had almost given up on Dad. Then, in her sadness, she went down to the harbor… and there she heard him whistling.

In chilly March, with only a week left in the third term, the class hears that their music teacher, Mrs. Oishi, is being transferred to a faraway school. After their final music lesson, Maruko’s class decides to hold a farewell party for her, and everyone throws themselves into the preparations. Surely none of them will ever forget those warm, happy days spent with such a kind teacher.

The whole class begins growing hyacinths in water. Since Maruko’s bulb is the very first to sprout, she becomes determined that hers will be the first to bloom as well. Then Chi-chan from next door asks for help starting one too, and before long Maruko finds herself foster-parent to two hyacinth bulbs—one at school and one at home.

Maruko ends up accompanying Grandpa to the health center. Her parents have sent her along, rather unwillingly, to keep an eye on the older folks—but deciding she may as well enjoy herself if she’s there, Maruko throws herself into the day with full enthusiasm. In the end, she gets tipsy at lunch from eating pickled melon, and one starts to wonder what exactly she went there for in the first place.

After observing spring flowers in class, Maruko is completely captivated by the beauty of cherry blossoms. Having never been flower-viewing before, she goes with her father to a nearby park to see the blossoms at night. As they admire the trees, they strike up a merry friendship with a group already having a blossom-viewing party, and the two of them end up noisily enjoying themselves.

Starting tomorrow, the first graders will begin eating school lunch. Every year when that happens, the third graders help take care of them. Since first graders are still so little, it’s a big responsibility. After a great deal of hustle and bustle, Maruko manages to do her duty—and the next day, one of the first graders hands her an envelope.

Tonight’s homework is an essay about one’s family. The children are supposed to write honestly about their parents and siblings—but Maruko doesn’t want to turn her family into an essay at all. Scolded by her mother to get on with it, she reluctantly observes everyone and finishes the composition. Then, to her horror, it gets printed in the class newsletter…

Maruko’s class is abuzz with talk of Nostradamus’s prophecy: mankind will perish in July 1999. Since the whole human race is doomed anyway, Maruko decides there’s no point working hard on tomorrow’s math test. Instead, she resolves to spend her days playing happily until 1999. But what will happen when the math test actually comes?

Today is Children’s Day. Maruko and Tama-chan go out to buy kashiwa mochi, and run into Maruo-kun, who invites them to his house. While there, Maruko fiddles with a samurai helmet display and ends up breaking it. She confesses everything to her parents, and then heads back with her mother to apologize…

Grandpa receives a postcard informing him that he’s been selected for the preliminary round of Belt Quiz Q & Q. As he heads to the venue, Maruko is so worried about him she can hardly concentrate at school. Meanwhile, Grandpa calmly breezes through the preliminaries and even makes it to the interview stage. But what will the results be…?

By a strange twist of fate, Sakura Tomozo, age seventy-six, ends up appearing on Belt Quiz Q & Q. Having already made it through the preliminaries, what awaits this elderly gentleman now? Maruko skips school to cheer him on, and before her eyes Grandpa answers one question after another…

The class is going on an outing to the planetarium. Wanting a telescope so she can study the stars, Maruko asks her parents to buy one—but they turn her down at once. Later, when the teacher asks for impressions of the planetarium and Maruko can only manage the exact same thoughts as Hamaji, she decides perhaps it’s just as well she never got that telescope after all.

After learning that the role of the press is to deliver the news people want quickly and accurately, Maruko and the others are assigned to make a class newspaper. Since Maruko is deeply curious about how the rich live, she asks Hanawa-kun for an interview. The paper turns out rather well—until they make the fateful decision to leave the title design to Butaro…

When a cake from the cupboard disappears and her mother immediately accuses her, Maruko gets indignant and vows to find the real culprit. Discovering a set of dentures, she becomes convinced she’s solved the mystery and begins grilling Grandpa. At school too, she starts locating missing indoor shoes and pencil cases one after another, and soon she’s feeling every bit the master detective.

In one of her usual passing fancies, Maruko suddenly announces that she wants to take ballet lessons. Hearing that vinegar makes the body more flexible, she decides to try drinking some. But all it does is make her feel sick, without making her any bendier. When she realizes she’d even have to give up her beloved hamburgers, she gives up on ballet with remarkable ease.

Miyako, an older cousin who used to live nearby, is getting married. Invited to the wedding, Maruko feels a little nervous about this entirely new experience. After enduring the long speeches and finally getting to eat, she thinks the hard part is over—but then Dad still has his official family representative speech ahead of him…

Maruko declares that Grandpa’s 270,000-yen quiz prize ought to be spent on something splendid. She proposes everything from a round-the-world trip to a grand hot-springs tour, but all her ideas are rejected. In the end, after everyone weighs in, the Sakura family settles on buying an air conditioner…

Maruko is to have a matching blazer made just like her sister’s, though she herself is not especially enthusiastic. Going to the tailor and having measurements taken sounds like far too much bother. In the end, because she’s still growing, the blazer is made too big—and with her sister’s old one also handed down to her, Maruko winds up stuck in ill-fitting blazers for a full six years.

On a Sunday just before summer vacation, Maruko, Tama-chan, and Butaro go exploring behind a shrine. There they discover an old Western-style mansion and decide to investigate it, but it proves so frightening that they turn back. The next day, the whole school is buzzing about the mansion. Maruko and her classmates head back there together—but then…

Maruko is beside herself with excitement when she’s invited to stay over at Tama-chan’s house. She eagerly starts packing, only to end up trying to take so much luggage it won’t even fit in her bag. Her mother finally steps in and gets everything sorted, and at long last Maruko sets off…

Even though it’s summer vacation at last, Maruko has to wake up early starting today to go to radio calisthenics, and she throws a fit about not wanting to go. After being late on the very first day, she decides to stay up all night so she won’t oversleep again. But naturally, no one can keep that sort of life up for long…

After seeing twins on television, Maruko becomes terribly envious and starts amusing herself by playing both “Maruko” and “Momoko” all by herself. Sent out on an errand by her mother, she spots a genuinely adorable pair of twins and begins trailing them, copying everything they do…

Summer vacation is nearly over, and as usual Maruko hasn’t touched most of her homework. When she suddenly realizes she forgot to keep the weather log, she panics. Even after asking her family, everyone’s memory is hopelessly vague. She tries her best to reconstruct the weather—but in the end simply writes “slightly cloudy” for every single day.

With the new term starting tomorrow, Maruko is in trouble: no matter how many times she counts, the souvenirs she brought back from the southern island are not enough for everyone. She somehow patches the numbers by buying more at the department store’s world goods section, but once she gets to school, the distribution works out differently again. And when she hands an extra badge to the passing Hamaji…

After giving Hamaji the last remaining island souvenir badge—which happens to say “I Love You”—Maruko gets mercilessly teased by the whole class. The gossip grows and grows, until before long it blossoms into an absurd love triangle involving Maruko, Hanawa-kun, and Migawa-san.

Tomorrow is Respect for the Aged Day. Maruko wants to do something nice since she has both a grandpa and a grandma, but she can’t think of anything. So she decides to ask Grandpa directly. Then, determined to make his dream come true, she racks her brains and comes up with a plan.

Maruko normally has absolutely no interest in neighborhood association events—but this time it’s an amusement park. The moment she hears that, she’s wildly excited and joins in with her father and older sister. Dragging along an unwilling Dad, the three of them have an uproariously noisy day together.

When Maruko learns that her classmates all take lessons in one thing or another, she decides she wants to learn something too. Her mother offers to teach her cooking, but Maruko soon begins to suspect she’s simply being used for labor. She then places her hopes in the fishing lessons Dad promises to teach her…

Maruko’s class goes on a social studies field trip to a candy factory. Though the point is supposed to be learning about society, Maruko can only think about the souvenir she expects to get on the way home. She gets lost in the factory and misses out on the souvenir—but even worse, there’s a written report waiting for her at the end.

Since she has no idea what matsutake mushrooms even are, Maruko doesn’t think much when she hears dinner will be matsutake rice. Once she tastes it, the flavor seems a bit too subtle, so she dumps furikake on top. The next day at school she learns matsutake is incredibly expensive, and desperately tries to remember what it tasted like…

It’s finally Maruko’s class’s turn to create the menu for the special school lunch day. Maruko comes up with her own idea, but loses the vote. Since the class ends up choosing foods she likes just as much, all that’s left is to wait for the day itself. And at last the long-awaited lunch arrives…

Lately, kidnapping cases have been happening around the country. There are even rumors of a child being taken in Shimizu, where Maruko lives. Then one evening, as Maruko is walking home, a suspicious man calls out to her and approaches. Maruko runs for dear life, with the middle-aged man chasing after her. But who is he really…?

Dad borrows an 8mm camera from a friend. They decide to start by filming dinner that night, but the moment the camera is pointed at them, the whole family stiffens up. The next day, Fujiki-kun, Nagasawa-kun, Tama-chan, and Hanawa-kun come over for a screening party…

Today is the local festival. Maruko can’t go unless she finishes her homework first, so she enlists Grandpa’s help. Once it’s done, the two of them head happily to the festival grounds, where they start buying things they would never normally buy…

Trying to become an admirable person, Maruko reads biographies and attempts to imitate great people—but everything she does is half-hearted and short-lived, and every time, everyone laughs at her. Yet she keeps thinking that one day she’ll write a song… and the song she finally creates fifteen years later turns out to be that huge hit.

The teacher knows someone with a mountain full of mandarins, so next Sunday Maruko and the others are all invited to go mandarin picking. On the cheerful bus ride home, however, although the take-home mandarins are supposed to cost extra, Hamaji’s backpack seems to contain a few he quietly helped himself to…

A bazaar is being held at school, and when Maruko gets home she begins gathering up things from all over the house to donate. On the big day, she goes with Dad and comes home with all sorts of bargain treasures. In the end, though, the things she bought are simply tucked away in the closet—to be donated to next year’s bazaar.

Maruko and her friends have long wanted to visit Hanawa-kun’s house just once. At last, they get the chance to step inside. Hanawa-kun’s home is even more astonishing than they imagined, and everyone can do little but stand there in stunned amazement…

While visiting Hanawa-kun’s house, Maruko and the others meet Mark, a friend who has come to visit from abroad. Just as they start to get close to him, he leaves for New York together with Hanawa-kun’s mother. Seeing him off, Maruko realizes how lucky she is to have her parents and friends all nearby.