Breakdown of Wczoraj wieczorem zrobiliśmy sobie dobrą kolację.
dobry
good
wieczorem
in the evening
zrobić
to do / to make (someone something)
wczoraj
yesterday
kolacja
the supper / dinner (evening meal)
sobie
to oneself / oneself (after a preposition)
Questions & Answers about Wczoraj wieczorem zrobiliśmy sobie dobrą kolację.
Why do we use sobie here instead of a regular pronoun for "us"?
Sobie is a reflexive pronoun in the Dative case, meaning "for oneself" (or myself, ourselves, etc.). Because the people doing the action are the same as the people receiving the benefit ("we made it for ourselves"), you use sobie. It is very commonly paired with verbs like zrobić (to make) or kupić (to buy) to show you are treating yourself!
Why use zrobiliśmy instead of robiliśmy?
Zrobiliśmy is the perfective (completed) form of the verb. You use it here because making the dinner was a single, finished action in the past. If you used the imperfective form robiliśmy, it would mean "we were making" (focusing on the process) or "we used to make".
Why does the ending of dobra kolacja (good dinner) change to dobrą kolację?
The dinner is the direct object of the verb zrobiliśmy (we made), so it takes the Accusative case. For feminine singular words, the noun ending changes from -a to -ę (kolację), and the adjective ending changes from -a to -ą (dobrą).
Why is it wieczorem instead of just wieczór (evening)?
To say that something happened "in the evening" or "during the evening", Polish uses the Instrumental case form wieczorem. You don't need a preposition like "in" or "at". Combined with wczoraj (yesterday), it simply means "yesterday evening".
Learn Wczoraj wieczorem zrobiliśmy sobie dobrą kolację and more in Polish
All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.
- ✓ Practice with interactive exercises
- ✓ Track your progress with spaced repetition
- ✓Learn at your own pace — completely free