Faster sa att min orange skjorta var fin, men farbror tyckte bättre om den lila jackan.

They are specific family words:

• faster = your father’s sister
• farbror = your father’s brother

Swedish makes this distinction very clearly. Compare:

• moster = mother’s sister
• morbror = mother’s brother

So faster and farbror are not just any aunt and uncle; they are specifically on the father’s side.

Also, farbror can sometimes be used more generally for uncle or even as an old-fashioned/polite way to address an older man, but in this sentence it most naturally means paternal uncle.

In Swedish, family words are often used without min, mitt, or mina when the relationship is obvious from context.

So:

• Faster sa att ... can mean Aunt said that ...
• Farbror tyckte ... can mean Uncle thought ... or My uncle thought ..., depending on context

This works a bit like English uses Mom, Dad, or Auntie without always saying my.

If you want to be fully explicit, you can say:

• min faster
• min farbror

sa is the past tense of säga, meaning to say.

So:

• säga = to say
• sa = said

The word att means that here.

So sa att = said that

Example:

• Hon sa att bilen var dyr. = She said that the car was expensive.

In everyday Swedish, att is sometimes omitted after sa, especially in speech, but keeping it is very normal and clear.

After a possessive like min, Swedish normally uses the indefinite form of the noun.

So you say:

• min skjorta = my shirt
• not min skjortan

That is different from English, because in English my and the are separate choices, but Swedish shows definiteness partly with the ending on the noun.

So:

• skjorta = shirt
• skjortan = the shirt
• min skjorta = my shirt

A possessive already makes the noun specific, so Swedish does not usually add the definite ending too.

Orange is one of those color adjectives that often stays the same instead of following the most regular adjective pattern.

In this sentence, orange is the normal form:

• min orange skjorta = my orange shirt

Many Swedish adjectives change form depending on gender, number, and definiteness, but some color words such as orange and lila are often treated as unchanged.

So a learner should mainly remember that orange here does not take an extra ending.

Because skjorta is an en-word (common gender), and the predicate adjective agrees with it.

• en skjorta
• therefore skjortan var fin / min skjorta var fin

Compare:

• ett hus var fint = a house was nice
• en skjorta var fin = a shirt was nice

So:

• fin is used with a singular en-word
• fint is used with a singular ett-word

It means liked ... better or preferred.

Break it down:

• tycka om = to like
• tycka bättre om = to like better

So:

• farbror tyckte bättre om den lila jackan = uncle liked the purple jacket better = uncle preferred the purple jacket

This is important because tycka by itself usually means think or have an opinion:

• Jag tycker att den är fin. = I think it is nice.

But:

• Jag tycker om den. = I like it.

So the om is essential here.

Because bättre is the comparative form of bra.

• bra = good / well
• bättre = better

In this expression, Swedish uses bättre with tycka om:

• tycka om = like
• tycka bättre om = like better

So this is not a literal word-for-word copy of English structure, but it works very similarly in meaning.

This is a very common Swedish pattern called double definiteness.

When a noun is definite and has an adjective before it, Swedish usually uses:

• a definite word such as den, det, or de
• plus the definite ending on the noun

So:

• jackan = the jacket
• den lila jackan = the purple jacket

You normally cannot just say lila jackan by itself in standard Swedish when you mean the purple jacket. The den is usually needed.

Compare:

• jackan = the jacket
• den fina jackan = the nice jacket
• den lila jackan = the purple jacket

Because lila is another adjective that often stays the same in all forms.

So you get:

• en lila jacka
• ett lila hus
• den lila jackan
• de lila jackorna

Unlike a regular adjective such as fin:

• en fin jacka
• ett fint hus
• de fina jackorna

So lila is useful to memorize as an adjective that usually does not change form.

Because the two noun phrases mean different things:

• min orange skjorta = my orange shirt
• den lila jackan = the purple jacket

In Swedish:

• after a possessive like min, the noun is usually in the indefinite form
• with the, especially when there is an adjective, Swedish uses double definiteness

So:

• min skjorta = my shirt
• jackan = the jacket
• den lila jackan = the purple jacket

This contrast is very normal in Swedish grammar.