Good comment TP. I too realized that after my comment here. If one holds the iPad with two hands and a finger happens to touch the screen say in the corner the auto focus might take over and focus on an object that is out of the center of the pic.
To the original poster: if you saved any of your out of focus pics, see if "any" area of the pic is actually in focus?
Also, the brighter the light, the clearer your pics will come out. Although, for a camera without an LED flash like most phones now have, it still takes decent lower light snapshots. Don't forget the front camera is of a lower resolution and is really just for Face Time and Skype type video conferencing.