I have only given a few quilts away to immediate family except for baby quilts, those I have made for friends. For the most part I have had a VERY positive experience with gifting my quilts and the recipients were always enthusiastic when opening the gifted quilt. And yes, I know that is not the"true" spirit of gifting to get an enthusastic reception of the gift but we invest so much of ourselves in our quilts it would break my heart to see one tossed aside like so much disposable crap so prevalent in today's society. As a result, I do think long and hard before gifting. I think the biggest problem with most non quilters is they have seen the el cheapo slave labor made in China quilts for sale so cheap they think it is nothing for us to make them and there is still that mentality out there that things can be home made or hand crafted for even less expense then the el cheapo slave labor made in china. I am sure their jaws would drop if they ever set foot in a fabric shop or LQS at the price of fabric!
The best response I got was from DMIL. She said to me "this is such a special gift because someone loved me enough to make me a quilt" I couldn't ask for a better response.