'How I Met Your Mother' Season 7 Episode Guide

Episode Guide to the 2011-2012 Season of 'How I Met Your Mother' on CBS

How I Met Your Mother
Photo courtesy of CBS

On the sixth season of How I Met Your Mother, Ted (Josh Radnor) still didn’t meet the mother of his children, but his friends Marshall (Jason Segel) and Lily (Alyson Hannigan) did get pregnant with their first child, while Barney (Neil Patrick Harris) entered into his first adult relationship, and Robin (Cobie Smulders) worried that she had missed her opportunity. The seventh season features Marshall and Lily preparing for a new child, Barney and Robin dating other people and Ted still waiting for true love. Read on for the ​How I Met Your Mother Season 7 episode guide.

Episode 1
Title:
“The Best Man”
Original Airdate: September 19, 2011

The gang goes to Cleveland for Ted’s high school friend Punchy’s wedding, where Ted is worried about breaking down during his best-man speech. Lily and Marshall are trying not to tell anyone about her pregnancy, and when they finally reveal the news, a drunk Marshall accidentally starts a fight between the bride and groom’s families at the wedding. Robin realizes that she still has feelings for Barney, but he ends up trying to get back together with Nora. Sometime in the future, Barney is getting married, but we don’t see who the bride is.

Episode 2
Title:
“The Naked Truth”
Original Airdate: September 19, 2011

Ted starts dating two different women and tries to choose one, but ends up deciding to wait until he meets a woman he can truly fall in love with. Barney tries to win Nora back, but she’s not easily convinced. He resolves not to leave the diner where they meet until she agrees to go out with him, and she finally gives in. Marshall is worried that an embarrassing drunken video of him online will prevent him from getting his dream job at an environmental law firm, but his new boss (Martin Short) doesn’t care.

Episode 3
Title:
“The Ducky Tie”
Original Airdate: September 26, 2011

Ted runs into his ex-girlfriend Victoria and decides to make up for having cheated on her with Robin. They share a kiss, but Victoria has to return to her boyfriend who’s about to propose to her. She tells Ted that his relationships don’t work out because he’s still hung up on Robin. Barney bets Marshall that he can perform the complicated cooking techniques at an Asian restaurant, and will get to touch Lily’s pregnancy-enhanced breasts in return. But Lily distracts him, and as the loser, Barney must wear Marshall’s silly-looking tie with pictures of ducks on it for an entire year.

Episode 4
Title:
“The Stinson Missile Crisis”
Original Airdate: October 3, 2011

Robin ends up in court-ordered therapy for assault and spends forever telling her therapist (Kal Penn) about what happened. When Nora goes out of town for work, Barney tries to dismantle all the scams he has in place to help him get laid. Robin helps him even though she’s secretly jealous of Nora. She almost lets one last bimbo get to Barney, but finally comes to her senses and tackles the girl to keep her from ruining Barney’s time with Nora. Ted keeps interfering with Marshall and Lily’s baby-planning activities and has to learn to let them have their space.

Episode 5
Title:
“Field Trip”
Original Airdate: October 10, 2011

Robin’s therapist terminates their therapy because he’s attracted to her, and the two of them start dating. Ted tries to take his architecture class on a field trip to the building he designed, but he can’t get onto the construction site, so he takes them to random locations around town. Marshall’s formerly hard-nosed boss has gone soft because he believes fighting for the environment is futile, and Marshall inspires him to fight again. Barney obsesses over his certainty that Nora has lied about her age, but it turns out he was just manufacturing a reason to worry.

Episode 6
Title:
“Mystery vs. History”
Original Airdate: October 17, 2011

Ted meets a new woman and asks the group not to research her online, so he can get to know her at the moment. Barney and Robin do the research anyway and send Ted a link while he’s on his date, which he can’t stop himself from reading, and it ruins the experience. Marshall and Lily decide not to learn the gender of their child before he or she is born, and Barney keeps bugging them until they finally give in and learn that they’re having a boy. Robin’s former therapist/new boyfriend Kevin can’t resist psychoanalyzing the group and determines that they’re completely dysfunctional.​

Episode 7
Title:
“Noretta”
Original Airdate: October 24, 2011

Barney’s brother James (Wayne Brady) comes to visit and is creeped out by how much Nora reminds him of their mother, and soon everyone in the group is seeing their parents in their romantic partners. Barney and Nora are set to finally have sex for the first time, but their night is a series of disasters. Kevin gets upset at how close Robin and Ted are but then realizes Ted is just fragile and alone. Lily’s pregnancy is making her feel like she isn’t sexy, so Marshall tries to turn her on.

Episode 8
Title:
“The Slutty Pumpkin Returns”
Original Airdate: October 31, 2011

After 10 years, Ted finally tracks down the girl he met at a Halloween party who was dressed as a slutty pumpkin (played by Katie Holmes). Even though they try to make things work, they just have no connection whatsoever, and go their separate ways. Lily’s grandparents decide to give her and Marshall their house in the suburbs now that they’re moving to Florida. Lily wants to move out there, but Marshall is worried that it’s just her pregnancy talking, and they decide to hold off on the decision. Robin mocks Barney when she discovers that he’s one-quarter Canadian.

Episode 9
Title:
“Disaster Averted”
Original Airdate: November 7, 2011

Ted tells Kevin about the group’s experience during Hurricane Irene, which involved Ted trying to get everyone to head to his house in Westchester and completely failing. Instead, everyone stayed in New York and rode out the storm. Marshall agrees to let Barney stop wearing the ducky tie in exchange for three free slaps because Barney is about to meet Nora’s parents and wants to impress them. Later on, Barney and Robin recall a near-romantic moment they shared during the hurricane that wasn’t part of Ted’s story, and end up making out in the back of a cab.

Episode 10
Title:
“Tick Tick Tick”
Original Airdate: November 14, 2011

After Barney and Robin sleep together, they decide that they have to break up with their respective significant others and give their relationship another try. Barney breaks up with Nora just after he meets her parents, but Robin can’t bring herself to break up with Kevin after he tells her he loves her, so Barney is left alone and devastated. Ted and Marshall get high at a concert and ponder how life is passing them by.

Episode 11
Title:
 “The Rebound Girl”
Original Airdate: November 21, 2011

Ted and Barney get the idea that they should team up to adopt a baby together since they’re both single and won’t be starting families any time soon. Marshall and Lily decide they want to move to Lily’s grandparents’ house on Long Island, and Robin is very upset that they might be leaving New York. For Thanksgiving, everyone goes to the Long Island house, where Robin locks herself in the bathroom to protest Lily and Marshall’s move and Barney shows up with a baby (that turns out to belong to his brother James). After Barney gives back his temporary baby, Robin tells him that she’s pregnant.

Episode 12
Title:
 “Symphony of Illumination”
Original Airdate: December 5, 2011

Barney is at first excited to learn that Robin is pregnant and he might be a father, but then the doctor tells Robin that she isn’t pregnant and actually can’t have a baby. Barney and Robin are both relieved that Robin isn’t pregnant, but Robin gets depressed about being infertile, even though she never wanted kids, and doesn’t tell anyone about it. Even though he doesn’t know what’s wrong, Ted does his best to cheer Robin up, and she feels less alone. Marshall gets duped by a local teen when he tries to decorate his and Lily’s suburban house for Christmas.

Episode 13
Title:
 “Tailgate”
Original Airdate: January 2, 2012

Marshall tries to get some private time at his dad’s grave, but a crowd of people moves in on his moment. Marshall tells his dad about New Year’s Eve, when Lily and Marshall argued about Marshall’s desire to pass fascination with the paranormal on to their child; Ted and Barney opened a bar called Puzzles in Ted’s apartment; and Robin ended up filling in for her drunk boss on a TV New Year’s countdown. The next day, Marshall realizes that sharing the moment is what his dad would have wanted, and Lily gets to see her dad, who she thought didn’t care that she was pregnant.

Episode 14
Title:
 “46 Minutes”
Original Airdate: January 16, 2012

Lily and Marshall finally move into their house on Long Island, and the gang doesn’t seem the same without them. Barney gets Ted, Robin, and Kevin to go with him to a strip club. They then follow Lily’s Russian stripper doppelganger to an underground poker game and get robbed. Lily’s dad has been staying at the house for two weeks and is getting on Marshall and Lily’s nerves. After their harrowing night, the gang (minus Kevin) makes a surprise visit to Marshall and Lily’s house, and Lily’s dad agrees to move out soon.

Episode 15
Title:
 “The Burning Beekeeper”
Original Airdate: February 6, 2012

Lily and Marshall throw a disastrous housewarming party at their house on Long Island. Lily’s dad has been keeping bees in the basement, and they escape from their enclosures and fill the house. Marshall has a confrontation with his boss, Mr. Cootes (Martin Short), about working too many hours. Barney hooks up with Lily and Marshall’s potentially crazy and violent neighbor. Robin and Ted argue about Robin’s meanness. The party ends with Mr. Cootes on fire in Lily’s dad’s beekeeper suit, but the crisis is ultimately averted.

Episode 16
Title:
 “The Drunk Train”
Original Airdate: February 13, 2012

Kevin asks Robin to marry him, and Robin at first says yes. But then she convinces Kevin that she’s not right for him because she isn’t going to have children, and they break up. Barney and Ted ride “the drunk train,” the final train of the night to Long Island, full of inebriated women who are desperate to hook up. Barney finds himself reluctantly falling for a woman who calls him on all of his underhanded pick-up tactics. After Robin’s break-up with Kevin, a lonely Ted confesses to Robin that he’s in love with her.

Episode 17
Title:
 “No Pressure”
Original Airdate: February 20, 2012

Right after Ted declares his love to Robin, she has to leave on a weeklong work trip to Russia. When Barney is left alone at Marshall and Lily’s house, he discovers their box of long-term bets about what will happen in their friends’ lives, which includes Lily betting that Ted and Robin won’t end up together. Ted realizes that he hasn’t ended up with Robin because Robin is in love with Barney. After Robin’s trip, she tells Ted that they can’t be together, and she moves out of their apartment.

Episode 18
Title:
 “Karma”
Original Airdate: February 27, 2012

Barney is fixated on Quinn, the woman who called out his deceptive dating tactics but also spent one amazing night with him. It turns out she’s Karma, a stripper at his favorite gentlemen’s club. She milks him for hundreds of dollars in lap dances, but he finally gets her to agree to a real date. Ted tries to figure out what to do with Robin’s empty room, while Robin stays with Lily and Marshall on Long Island, which she hates. Ted moves out of his apartment and leaves it to Lily and Marshall, so they can move back to Manhattan and have space to raise their child.

Episode 19
Title:
 “The Broath”
Original Airdate: March 19, 2012

When the group meets Quinn, she acts controlling and manipulative, and they start to worry that she’s just using Barney for his money. After Barney and Quinn announce they are moving in together, the group stages an intervention to express their concerns, and Quinn finds out and breaks up with him. When the group goes to apologize, Quinn and Barney reveal that it was just an elaborate plan to mess with Barney’s friends, but the two really are moving in together. Ted and Robin have trouble returning to being friends after Ted’s declaration of love for Robin.

Episode 20
Title:
 “Trilogy Time”
Original Airdate: April 9, 2012

Ted, Marshall, and Barney get together for their every-three-years tradition of watching the original Star Wars trilogy, and they reflect on how their lives have changed in each three-year interval since they started, and how things are different from the way they wanted them to be. Ted laments that his life will never work out how he wants it to, but Future Ted reveals that three years later, in 2015, Ted will have a baby daughter and be very happy. Barney finally decides that he doesn’t want to just keep hooking up with random women, and embraces being committed to Quinn.

Episode 21
Title:
 “Now We’re Even”
Original Airdate: April 16, 2012

Marshall gets upset when Lily has a sex dream about Barney’s limo driver Ranjit. Barney insists that Ted go out with him every night and do something legendary. Ted gets fed up with Barney’s need for constant activities, and Barney admits it’s because he needs to distract himself from thinking about what Quinn is doing at the strip club. When the pilot of a news chopper has a stroke, Robin has to land the helicopter, and she achieves instant fame. Although they’re still not talking, Ted texts Robin to say he’s glad she’s okay.

Episode 22
Title:
 “Good Crazy”
Original Airdate: April 30, 2012

Barney can’t handle Quinn being a stripper and tries to get her to quit, but she refuses. Marshall is overly obsessed with preparing for the arrival of his and Lily’s baby, so Lily tricks him into taking an Atlantic City vacation with Barney. Just as Marshall and Barney get drunk and turn off their cell phones, Lily goes into labor. Ted tries to meet women via online dating so he can get Robin off his mind, but every girl he goes out with somehow reminds him of Robin.

Episode 23
Title:
 “The Magician’s Code”
Original Airdate: May 14, 2012

Marshall and Barney are still stuck in Atlantic City as Lily goes into labor, so Ted and Robin try to distract her by telling stories about the group. Marshall finally makes it back just in time to see the birth of his son, whom they name Marvin. The group encourages Ted to go after Victoria again, and when he gets in touch with her, she shows up in her wedding dress and tells Ted she wants to run away with him and leave her fiancé. Ted hesitates but then drives off with Victoria. Barney and Quinn head for a trip to Hawaii, and at the airport Barney stages an elaborate ruse involving a magic trick and the TSA that ends with his proposing to Quinn. In a flashforward, however, Barney is shown getting married to Robin, not Quinn.