Originally Posted by
charity-crafter
My inlaws are like this. Handmade means you're too cheap to buy something. You don't honor them when you make something. A real gift has to be store bought and expensive to show that you really value them. DH just sends a check every year now and let them figure out what they want.
One of my family said about my aunts quilts , "it's their hobby, they don't have anything esle to do and they enjoy doing this and then they dump it on the family as presents." I've never given that person anything hand made when I took up the craft.
You have expressed the problem to a tee! Sadly, more than a few people have this attitude, and they are usually people who have much more respect for paid work of any kind than anything that's done as an art or craft. After read some of these sad stories, I will be sure I know any potential giftee very well before I'll risk wasting my time and effort on one like that. I'm wondering if we could come up with some sort of a test, such as asking what they think would be a fair price to ask for something if you were selling it on Etsy or in a shop. The answer might tell you a lot about their respect or the lack thereof for handmade quilts. It might open up some dialogue and an opportunity to spell out what kind of investment went into the item, both in terms of costs and time. You could research what skilled workers earn in the working world, and express the value of your quilt in terms of those kinds of dollars in addition to the initial cost plus overhead (the cost of your machines, rulers, cutters, notions, etc.). For people who measure everything in terms of dollars, that's probably the only way to get through to them.