Look: How UAE families are celebrating the festive season in Dubai

From fake fireplaces to doorstep photos, eclectic foods and extravagant decor, UAE parents share the traditions and rituals they are doing to make this year's Christmas period magical for their kids...

The Elf on the Shelf is a huge modern trend, which started in 2005 in the US after an American family self-published a book based on the mother's personal family tradition of a cheeky house elf as a child. Today, parents use the toy Elves as a way of helping children to behave (as otherwise the elves may report back to Santa) as well as a way of adding some humorous festive sparkle and magic. The elves come to life at night and get up to all sorts of antics, which the children discover the next day. Dubai-based American mother of three Megan Kelly shared this picture of her daughters' elf in the kitchen mixer.

Mother of three girls and marketing manager of Citron, Megan Kelly says: "Growing up our whole family got together on Christmas Eve - in the lead up to Christmas from the age of 2 I would always make cookies with my grandmother. Just the two of us. This isn’t just gingerbread cookies it was a series of 7 or 8 different types that we would make across an entire weekend and she’d freeze for the whole family to enjoy on chrimstas eve. We did this all through even my wild university years until the year she died - it’s one of my favorite memories of childhood not just of Christmas. With my kids to this day we’ve kept the tradition alive and I’ve carried on making 3 types of her cookies - some of our best friends here have a similar tradition and so every year the kids get together in the run up to Christmas amd make cookies. It’s something a lot of families do but to me it carries a special meaning behind it and some really special memories."

Another fan of the Elf on the Shelf is Maria Mourad, a Lebanese designer and mother of two based in Dubai. Here you can see her elf has been ziplining from the Christmas tree overnight! She says she has been going overboard with Christmas decorations and magical touches to make up for the strange year her children have had. "First of all we started to put the Christmas decorations up very early, and we kept adding and adding and adding. Even my son said every day ‘Oh there’s a new thing’. We are compensating with more decorations, and I’m trying to make it the most magical possible for the children."

As a designer, Maria has created her own ornamental fireplace for the home - something that is a huge trend amongst parents in the UAE, and involves mums and dads repurposing cardboard boxes, covering them in brick-style paper or paint and using them as a fake fireplace against which to hand the Santa stockings. Maria says: In our tradition usually we celebrate on Christmas Eve. We do the gift exchange on the 24 evening, and we have the turkey for dinner. And then on the 25 in the morning we open the presents that Santa got them overnight. But the Christmas eve dinner is more important than the lunch on the 25th. What we do is the cake – the log cake, we call it bouche de noel, the kids decorate it and there are tiny santas and trees and we use sugar to make it look like snow."

Here are some more of Maria's homemade decorations: cone Christmas trees made with peppermint sweets and yarn. Maria says she has picked up lots of new and different Christmas traditions since being in the cultural melting pot of the UAE: "What I love about the UAE is that we tend to meet so many people from different countries and we tend to learn about their different traditions, and whenever there is anything magical coming from any other country I would follow it and apply it in our house. One more thing I love about celebrating in the UAE is the amazing weather, and there are so many activities for the children – lots of markets, Santa meets, gingerbread-making, which we appreciate."

Another new tradition that families have been doing this year is the festive doorstep picture, says photographer Wendy Mayo from De Un Photography. Inspired by the lockdown doorstep photo trend, these family images are a festive version.

De Un Photographer Wendy says: "We have found that families having spent so much more time together and in their homes really feel connected to their spaces, grateful to have a safe place to be and perhaps having a bit more time to rediscover some traditions from home like making dishes from home countries, introducing their children to games they used to play as children, even taking up hobbies they have always wanted more time for."

Wendy explains: "We set about trying to inject a bit of festive spirit for families. Especially for those, who like me, would rather be travelling back to spend Christmas with loved ones. So my business partner Fleur and I donned Christmas hats and antlers, brought Christmas music with us and quarantined treats for the little ones and set about creating Christmas doorstep mini-shoots. It was so much fun!"

"We also took doorstep images where people had decorated their own decorations which was super!" says Wendy. "The requests just kept pouring in. It has been a real lift again for us as we start to get a little nostalgic at this time of the year, we got to catch up with families we met doing the original lockdown doorsteps, and met lots of new families. "

"Hopefully we have brought smiles to everyone’s faces too," concludes Wendy.

Another big thing at Christmas? Food of course! We love hearing about the different traditional foods of various cultures. The D'Souzas says that, although they are sadly unable to see their son this year as he is stuck in the UK, wife Charmain has prepared her traditional Goan dishes for Christmas just to keep the spirit high. “Kulkuls” – a famous Goan dish for Christmas is on the menu this year for the family. “Kulkuls” are a form of Filhoses Enrolodas, the Portuguese Christmas sweet. She has also made some traditional milk toffees and of course the traditional Christmas cake. She is also readying all ingredients to prepare “beef croquette” – another tradition for Christmas with the family.

Slovakian mum of two Kat Ballinger has shared photos of her country's traditional potato salad and Christmas soup: "In my home country of Slovakia we open presents on 24th December so Christmas Eve (Štedrý Deň) is “the main day” for us. Since morning, ladies are usually busy in the kitchen cooking traditional Christmas feast, our Christmas soup – kapustnica (delicious sour kraut soup with mushrooms, smoked meat and sausage) and making the potato salad and fried fish. As per old traditions, you are not supposed to eat the whole day, so you can enjoy the Christmas dinner and those who fast are rewarded with “ Seeing the golden piglet” (for good luck)."

Kat says that her own mother would start baking cookies three weeks before Christmas, and that there would be hundreds of different types of cookie in different festive shapes and with different decorations. "Some of our other traditions are putting one extra plate on the table for all the loved who are not among us anymore, some families put coins or a cash money under the plates on the table-to have prosperous next year, other families cut and share a walnut and an apple (you have to try to cut it horizontally to get a perfect star shape)- it’s symbolise to be heathy and happy all year round. We also start our Christmas dinner with some special thin wafers (oplátky) with honey and garlic. After Christmas diner we eagerly wait for head of a family, normally the father-to ring a bell and then the long awaited opening of presents can start!"

Making gingerbread houses is another big trend in the UAE amongst families this year, which Kat's two children, Alex and Lily, have done. Kat likes to teach her own kids about the traditions they have back in Slovakia: "For Christmas Day and Boxing Day we would normally gather with family and enjoy another feast of roast duck or goose with red cabbage and steamed dumplings and then later in the afternoon we would dress up warmly try to walk off all the calories in around neighbourhood watching beautifully decorated houses and twinkling lights everywhere and as a child I remember our Christmas we always had snow so it would be just magical for us trying to catch falling snowflakes with our tongues."

Meanwhile Polish German teacher in Dubai Paulina Zdobylak says that she is having a much smaller Christmas this year, but will still be making some of the traditional foods with her mother, who is visiting. She said the mother daughter duo however will prepare 12 dishes – a tradition followed by her Polish-German family back home. “On Christmas day we will have only seafood and vegetables.”

Mean while South African-born Lyn Born, whose grown up sons both also live in Dubai with their families, shares her festive traditions: "We always do a big Christmas Eve dinner with lots of friends, our kids and their friends. I hate to think of anyone on their own for Christmas. We do Deep Fried Turkey!! Our specialty with all the traditional trimmings. It is a very festive evening. We have secret Santa, with stealing, which is hilarious!!"

We are particularly impressed with Lyn Born's Christmas tree, which she makes a particular effort with each year: "I love Christmas and put in a huge effort. I change the color scheme of my tree each year and spend a lot of time planning it. I also always have a beautiful wire and crystal ornament tree. Each year I add the new Swarovski snowflake to the tree."