If a quilt is meant as a gift, I do not hesitate tot send it out. I am blessed to have a friend who does LAQ very beautifully and, in my opinion, very inexpensively. I have been working to hone my skills on my sewing machine, but I doubt that I could ever do such quilting as my friend does. I love the cutting and piecing very much, but I, too, dread having to wrestle with a large quilt through a sewing machine.