Modern Family recap: Haley finally shares her secret and DeDe becomes a tree

This week on Modern Family, Jerry shows up to tie up DeDe’s loose ends and Haley ends up sharing her news with someone in the family.

Before Modern Family went on break Haley found out that she was pregnant. She spent last week’s episode trying to figure out if she and Dylan were ready to be parents and tonight, that was tested again. This was triggered by something she received from her grandmother who passed away earlier this season.

The inheritance

At the start of the episode, DeDe’s husband Jerry (Ed Begley, Jr.) shows up with some items that Dede left to her family. Among the gifts, are an old convertible (left to Claire), a box of old toys (left to the Dunphy kids), and a tree… that has been infused with DeDe’s ashes. She had wanted Claire and Mitch to decide who should have it but Claire doesn’t want it so that issue resolves itself.

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The Dunphys

In the trunk, Luke finds an old puzzle that he recalls solving as a kid while Alex failed to. He refers to it as her greatest shame as she poorly pretends it’s nothing. She ends up running off with the puzzle to finally put this behind her.

At the same time, Haley finds her favorite stuffed toy from her childhood. She gets emotional, alarming both of her siblings. Outside the house, Phil is incredibly excited about the old convertible and is able to talk Claire into taking it for a spin.

Jay and Jerry

Outside Jay’s house, Gloria notices that Jerry is still sitting in his car. She goes out, seeing that he’s hurting and wanting to help. Jay, of course is against it but she brings him inside. Gloria and Jay had just gotten into an argument about Jay chasing off her cousins for overstaying their welcome and now he has another unwanted guest.

As the fight continues, Jerry tells Jay that he needs to stop and apologize to Gloria. Even if he knows he’s right. Initially Jay resists, losing his phone in the process when Gloria puts it in the garbage disposal, but then he decides to give it a try. When he apologizes to Gloria, she softens, apologizes for not being honest about how long her cousins were staying, and says that she’s going to go buy him a nice steak. Jay is blown away and thanks Jerry for this “life changing” advice.

Cam and Mitch

When Mitch shows up with the DeDe tree, Cam is upset. He brings up all of the broken promises that Mitch has made over the course of their relationship. Chief among them was the promise to move to Missouri with him and take over his uncle’s farm.

Later, Cam comes home crying (he finally watched E.T., fulfilling one of his old promises) and now he wants Mitch to make good on his. Mitch again refuses to move to Missouri however.

Claire’s convertible

As Phil and Claire enjoy riding around with the top down, Claire starts reminiscing. She tells Phil that she lost her virginity in the convertible and that changes his entire mood. The song “Born to be Wild” is what triggered the memory and Phil promptly ejects the 8-track.

Back at the house, Claire closes the garage and tells Phil she wants to make him the best time she’s ever had in the car. Phil, having heard some of he stories says that they should shoot for top three.

Dunphy kids part 2

Back at the house, Haley is having a hard time taking care of the doll. She has already run it over with her car and set it on fire since we last left her and she’s having a really hard time with the idea of taking care of a child.

Luke walks into the kitchen to find Alex googling how to solve the puzzle and this turns into a physical altercation. Haley breaks it up and then injures the doll one more time. Thinking Luke has left the room she confesses to Alex that she’s pregnant (Luke then pops up out of nowhere) and they’re both in shock as she starts freaking out.

That’s when Alex and Luke tell her that she is going to be fine and that she has basically been taking care of them all of their lives. She’s always there to break up their fights and look out for them. They tell her she’ll be just fine taking care of a kid.

Conclusions

After the success of apologizing to Gloria, Jay and Jerry head to Mitch’s house for him to apologize to the DeDe tree. He does, and it’s very heartfelt. Jerry then talks to the tree and vents because he just saw Jay use his method and get an apology back from Gloria, something DeDe never gave him.

In the meantime, Mitch had been listening to the entire thing and when Cam comes in he’s ready to try this method. He tells Cam that they can move to Missouri, expecting that Cam will tell him that they don’t really have to and thanking him for even suggesting it as an option. However, Cam is ready to go and starts telling Mitch the details of farm life.

Over at the Dunphy house, Claire and Phil open the garage only to see Mitch and Cam standing there with the tree. They heard everything but came to drop the tree off to Claire. She didn’t want it before but now she does because her mom caught her in the car with a boy and didn’t shame her for it and the car reminded her of this good side of her mom. Something she had forgotten after she died.

Meanwhile, Haley sticks her head out of a second story window to ask if there were raccoons in the garage (she had also heard her parents, unknowingly). She then drops the doll out of the window as the episode ends.

Modern Family returns next Wednesday at 9/8 Central on ABC.