Het buurmeisje helpt mijn schoonmoeder met zware tassen.

The neighbor girl helps my mother‑in‑law with heavy bags.

Breakdown of Het buurmeisje helpt mijn schoonmoeder met zware tassen.

• met: with
• mijn: my
• helpen: to help
• de tas: the bag
• zwaar: heavy
• het buurmeisje: the neighbor girl
• de schoonmoeder: the mother-in-law

Questions & Answers about Het buurmeisje helpt mijn schoonmoeder met zware tassen.

What does het mean in het buurmeisje? Is it the same as it in English?

Het here is the definite article “the” for a neuter noun.

Dutch has two definite articles:

• de – for common-gender nouns (most nouns)
• het – for neuter-gender nouns (including almost all diminutives like meisje)

So:

• het meisje = the girl (neuter)
• het buurmeisje = the neighbor girl

It is not “it” in this sentence; it’s just “the”.

Why is it het buurmeisje and not de buurmeisje?

Because meisje is a diminutive (ending in -je), and all diminutives in Dutch are het-words.

• meisje comes from meid / meis
  • -je (little girl)
• All words ending in -je, -tje, -pje, -kje, -etje are neuter and take het:
  • het hondje (the little dog)
  • het huisje (the little house)
  • het meisje (the girl)

Since buurmeisje is built on meisje, it stays a het-word: het buurmeisje.

What exactly does buurmeisje mean? Is it just “neighbor”?

Buurmeisje is more specific than just “neighbor”:

• buur = neighbor (as a base element in compounds)
• meisje = girl

So buurmeisje = neighbor girl, meaning:

• A female neighbor who is (usually) a girl/young woman.

Compare:

• buurjongen = neighbor boy
• buurvrouw = female neighbor (adult woman)
• buurman = male neighbor (adult man)

So het buurmeisje is “the neighbor girl”, not just any neighbor.

Why is the verb helpt and not helpen in this sentence?

Because the subject is het buurmeisje (3rd person singular), and Dutch verbs change form with the subject.

Infinitive: helpen (to help)

Present tense:

• ik help
• jij / je helpt
• hij / zij / het helpt
• wij / jullie / zij helpen

So with het buurmeisje (like zij = she):

• Het buurmeisje helpt … = The neighbor girl helps …

If the subject were plural:

• De buurmeisjes helpen mijn schoonmoeder met zware tassen.
  (The neighbor girls help my mother-in-law with heavy bags.)

What does schoonmoeder literally mean, and does it mean “stepmother” or “mother‑in‑law”?

Schoonmoeder is a compound:

• schoon (historically “clean / pure”, but here it’s just a fixed element)
• moeder (mother)

In modern Dutch:

• schoonmoeder = mother‑in‑law (your spouse’s mother)

For clarity:

• schoonmoeder = mother‑in‑law
• stiefmoeder = stepmother

So in this sentence, mijn schoonmoeder = my mother‑in‑law, not my stepmother.

Why is it mijn schoonmoeder and not mijne schoonmoeder?

In modern standard Dutch, possessives before a noun use the short forms:

• mijn vader (my father)
• jouw moeder (your mother)
• zijn huis (his house)
• haar tas (her bag)

The longer forms (mijne, jouwe, zijne, etc.) are:

• mostly used without a noun:
  
  • Is dit jouw tas? – Nee, dat is de mijne. (No, that’s mine.)
• or in older / poetic language.

So:

• mijn schoonmoeder is correct and normal.
• mijne schoonmoeder would sound poetic/old-fashioned or dialectal.

Why is there no article before zware tassen? Why not met de zware tassen?

Dutch, like English, can omit the article when speaking generally or non‑specifically.

• met zware tassen = with heavy bags (some heavy bags, unspecified)
• met de zware tassen = with the heavy bags (specific bags that both speakers know about)

In this sentence, it’s natural to think she’s helping with heavy bags in general, so no article is needed.

Why is it zware tassen and not zwaar tassen?

Adjectives in Dutch usually get an -e ending before a plural noun with no article, and before most nouns with an article.

Rules (simplified):

1. Before a plural noun → add -e:

   • zware tassen (heavy bags)
   • grote huizen (big houses)

2. Before a de- or het- noun with an article → usually add -e:

   • de zware tas
   • het zware boek
   • mijn zware tas

So:

• zware tassen is correct.
• zwaar tassen is wrong in standard Dutch.

Can I move mijn schoonmoeder to the front of the sentence for emphasis?

Yes. Dutch word order in main clauses is flexible for emphasis, but the verb must stay in second position.

Neutral:

• Het buurmeisje helpt mijn schoonmoeder met zware tassen.

With emphasis on my mother‑in‑law:

• Mijn schoonmoeder helpt het buurmeisje met zware tassen.
  (Now she is helping the neighbor girl — different meaning!)

If you only want to emphasize her but keep the meaning (the girl is helping her), you can use intonation or a pronoun in speech, or a cleft sentence in writing:

• Het is mijn schoonmoeder die het buurmeisje met zware tassen helpt.
  (It’s my mother‑in‑law whom the neighbor girl is helping.)

Simply moving mijn schoonmoeder before helpt changes who is doing the helping, so be careful: in Dutch, word order affects who is the subject.

How would I say “The neighbor girl helps her with heavy bags” instead of “my mother‑in‑law”?

You replace mijn schoonmoeder with the object pronoun haar (her).

• Het buurmeisje helpt haar met zware tassen.
  = The neighbor girl helps her with heavy bags.

Word order:

• Subject: Het buurmeisje
• Verb: helpt
• Object pronoun: haar
• Prepositional phrase: met zware tassen

How do I turn this sentence into a yes/no question in Dutch?

In a yes/no question, the verb comes first.

Statement:

• Het buurmeisje helpt mijn schoonmoeder met zware tassen.

Question:

• Helpt het buurmeisje mijn schoonmoeder met zware tassen?
  = Does the neighbor girl help my mother‑in‑law with heavy bags?

Structure:

• Verb (helpt) + Subject (het buurmeisje) + Rest

Could I say Het buurmeisje helpt mijn schoonmoeder zware tassen dragen? Is that correct?

Yes, that’s also correct, and it’s quite natural.

Two options:

1. helpen met + noun

   • Helpt mijn schoonmoeder met zware tassen.
     (helps my mother‑in‑law with heavy bags)

2. helpen + iemand + infinitive

   • Helpt mijn schoonmoeder zware tassen dragen.
     (helps my mother‑in‑law carry heavy bags)

The second version is a bit more specific about the action (dragen = to carry). Both are grammatical; the nuance is:

• met zware tassen focuses on what she helps with.
• zware tassen dragen focuses on what action she helps her do.

Is buurmeisje always written as one word, not buur meisje?

Yes, in Dutch, most compounds are written as one word.

• buur
  • meisje → buurmeisje
• buren (neighbors) + huis (house) → burenhuis
• schoon
  • moeder → schoonmoeder

Writing buur meisje as two words would be interpreted as:

• een buur (a neighbor) + meisje (girl), but not a fixed compound. It looks odd and is not standard.

So always: het buurmeisje.

What’s the word order pattern in this sentence, and is it the normal Dutch order?

Yes, this is the normal main-clause order in Dutch:

• Het buurmeisje (Subject)
• helpt (Verb – 1st finite verb in 2nd position)
• mijn schoonmoeder (Indirect object / person being helped)
• met zware tassen (Prepositional phrase)

So the pattern is:

• S – V – (objects) – (other info)

This S–V–O structure is standard for main clauses in Dutch (just like English). Word order becomes different mainly in questions and subclauses.