Else Ury's Nesthäkchen is a Berlin doctor's daughter, Annemarie Braun, a slim, golden blond, quintessential German girl.

Anita's family expects her to marry Horst, but she gets engaged, to everyone’s surprise, to Ricardo Orlando, the son of wealthy neighbors.

One day Marietta notes a similarity between the kindergarten child Lenchen and Lotte, the foundling, who still lives in the Hartenstein house with the Kunzes, the household servants.

Marietta travels with her grandparents to Italy and in Genoa visits relatives of her paternal grandmother.

The whole family assembles, and Anita brings her little daughter Rosita, Annemarie's first great-grandchild, to the celebration.