Meine Schwiegermutter bleibt heute zu Hause, weil sie müde ist.

to be

Breakdown of Meine Schwiegermutter bleibt heute zu Hause, weil sie müde ist.

• das Haus: the house
• heute: today
• müde: tired

Questions & Answers about Meine Schwiegermutter bleibt heute zu Hause, weil sie müde ist.

Why is it Meine Schwiegermutter and not Mein Schwiegermutter?

Schwiegermutter is grammatically feminine in German (like Mutter), so it takes the feminine possessive form meine in the nominative case.

• mein = my (for masculine and neuter nouns in nominative)
• meine = my (for feminine and all plurals in nominative)

Since Schwiegermutter is the subject of the sentence and is feminine, you must say meine Schwiegermutter.

What exactly does Schwiegermutter mean, and how is it formed?

Schwiegermutter means mother-in-law.

It’s a compound noun:

• Schwieger- is a prefix used in family words to mean “-in-law” (like Schwiegervater = father-in-law, Schwiegersohn = son-in-law).
• Mutter means mother.

German often combines words into a single long noun like this; only the whole compound’s first letter is capitalized: Schwiegermutter.

Why is it bleibt and not just ist (why “stays at home” and not “is at home”)?