A gift, beautifully wrapped, sends a powerful message to the one who receives it. It proclaims, with its paper, ribbon and furbelows, that the recipient occupies a special place in the giver’s heart.

No one knows that better than Mount Desert Island graphic artist Karen Zimmerman, who devises delightful ways to wrap special presents for special people when the holiday season arrives.

“My friends call me the package queen,” she said. “I like putting things together. There are so many things out there.”

At the holidays, Karen Zimmerman is among many Mainers who put their imagination to work, gathering pine cones, sprigs of winterberry and other native, natural materials for use in gift wrapping. In their hands, the wrapping becomes a gift. Some of the people are artists; others have an innate sense of creativity, wrapping up a jar of homemade preserves in bubble wrap. Red raffia and silver-tipped pine cones complete the elegant presentation.

Central to Zimmerman’s “wrap it with style” philosophy, along with her artist’s eye for design, is the use of natural and “found” objects. “I try to find a novel use for commonplace objects,” she said.

Like wire, for example. She wrapped a package in black paper, speckled it with white dots, wound it with wire that fanned out from an off-center spot and at the point where the wire ends meet, she hot-glued a gray stone bearing a narrow line of white.

One of her tricks is to fold a sheet of white tissue paper in a small square, then dip the points and edges into several different shades of food coloring. The paper is unfolded and allowed to dry. The result is a bit like tie-dyeing and creates a lovely bit of paper to wrap something in.

“I like to take an idea and see where it goes,” she said. Sometimes the idea goes outside and comes back in with pine cones, birch bark, seashells, rose hips, sprays of dried plants, evergreens, winterberry, mountain ash berries, crab apple and moss. To create a packaging backdrop for those items, Zimmerman uses brown kraft paper tied up with twine or raffia.

She has been known to secure her packages with electrician’s tape, Bungee cords and rope. She also wraps things in Bubble Wrap and layers of tulle in many colors tied up with ribbons.

“It’s easy to end up as a packaging pack rat,” she laughed. “Keep your eyes open and look around your backyard.”

She also likes to use the reverse side of Tyvek, used in home construction. “It takes watercolor beautifully,” she noted.

Another one of her tricks is to spray paint lightly a piece of Kraft paper with green paint, lay cedar, pine and fir sprigs on the paper, then spray it again with gold paint. The evergreen sprigs work like reverse stencils.

It’s easy, she said, to get so caught up in the process of devising gift wrap, that you forget you’re supposed to be wrapping packages.

Holly Bertrand, Bucksport High School art teacher, knows how to get all wrapped up, too. She has been teaching art in Bucksport schools for 27 years, and has had plenty of experience teaching the art of decorating paper.

“My students decorate a lot of paper,” she said. “Whatever you can put ink or paint on can be used. Anything that will make a mark, anything with a raised or indented surface.”

Stamping techniques she and her students use for decorating paper include carved potatoes; carved soap, art erasers and pencil erasers; printing with natural objects such as leaves, ferns and poppy pods; and Styrofoam meat trays and sponges cut into shapes. Stamping is a versatile skill, one most of us learned by the time we were 9 years old.

Bertrand and her students also make “paste paper,” using a cooked paste made from starch or cake flour, colored with acrylic or tempera paints and spread with a foam brush on “any kind of wet paper.” Paper choices can include rice paper, newspaper, craft paper, construction paper, wallpaper, drawing paper or paper bags.

“Another great idea for gift wrapping is to decorate those white take-out food containers,” Bertrand said. These can be painted, stamped, stenciled, or embellished with glued on bits of paper.

At Molly’s in Winterport, a whole lot of wrapping is going on at this time of year. Kim Pitula, who has been wrapped up in wrapping at the shop for 25 years said a well-wrapped gift says, “You’re special.” A hallmark of the wrapping tradition at Molly’s is the handmade tissue paper flower.

“These are easy enough for kids to make,” Pitula said. First, you cut flower shapes from tissue paper. Next, you bend over one end a 4-inch-long green pipe cleaner and poke the other end through the center of the flower shape so that its snug against the bent over end. Give the paper a twist. Poke through a few more flower shapes, twisting as you go. Finally, make a bend in the other end of the pipe cleaner. These flowers may be afixed to gift bags or tucked under a pretty ribbon tying up the package and are inexpensive to make.

The key to successful wrapping, Pitula said, is organization and imagination. Have everything you need at hand, she said, including pre-made bows, satin, tulle and organza ribbon, boxes, scissors and gift bags.

“A personal touch is important,” she said.

Pitula offers these gift-wrapping tips:

. Add extra touches, like a sprig of balsam, a glass tree ornament, a lavender sprig. a cluster of dried roses or a cookie cutter.

. If you wrap gifts way ahead of the holiday, stick a little tag on the bottom of the gift that tells what the gift is so you won’t forget.

. Wrap a gift in a dish towel or a pretty handkerchief.

One final suggestion:, For a bit of preholiday fun with your children, decorate your own gift bags. Use small brown paper bags, the kind with twisted paper handles which may be purchased at local party supply stores. Cut out illustrations and motifs with holiday themes from newspapers and magazines, or holiday print fabrics, and glue them to the paper bags using a glue stick. Embellish the motifs by gluing on sequins, gold and silver stars, small beads or bits of glittery ribbon. Children may prefer to draw holiday pictures on the bags with crayons, colored chalks or acrylic paints.

No matter how the bags are decorated, they are unique and festive, and ready to carry the holiday spirit into the season.

Ardeana Hamlin can be reached at 990-8153 and ahamlin@bangordailynews.net.

Wrapping hotline

For those of you who are gift wrapping procrastinators, Christmas Eve can be haunted by terrible visions of unwrapped packages past. But have no fear, the Scotch brand gift wrapping tips hotline will be available to the public from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 23; and from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday, Dec. 24. Call toll free, (877) 872-6824, to get tips on how to wrap odd-shaped gifts, food items and what to do if you run out of wrapping supplies at the 11th hour.

The hotline will be staffed by previous winners and contestants in the Scotch Brand Most Gifted Wrapper Contest, an annual event held in New York City to determine who is America’s Most Gifted Wrapper.

And remember, you aren’t alone. A survey conducted by the 3M company last year determined that 36 percent of people wait until Dec. 23 or later to wrap Christmas gifts.

Wrapping made easy

. When using paste or glue, use an old telephone book as a “glue pad.” Flip the pages as they get gluey, using a fresh page for each glue job.

. Keep a box full of odds and ends you use when wrapping gifts. It will save time when you are ready to begin and save a trip to the store.

. Use double-backed tape, a cutting mat, Xacto knife and a straight edge to assist with the task. A bone folder or something made from hard plastic will ensure sharp creases in the wrapping paper.

. Recycle, recycle, recycle. “I used to rip off the gift wrapping, crunch it up, and throw it at the cat,” Karen Zimmerman said. “Now I eye the packages, assessing their possible use in another incarnation.”