MilesBuzz! - My 2013 travel: how to maximize my miles

Hey guys. Been lurking the forum for a while gathering information so I didn't sound like I'm here asking everything to be fed to me. Basically, I'm just looking for some advise on what would be the best way for me to maximize my miles and use as little out of pocket as necessary. I don't have a lot of miles, haven't churned much yet ;), but would like to use what I have wisely.

What I have currently:
leftover Delta SkyMiles (DH) 35000
leftover Delta SkyMiles (myself) 2400
AA miles (DH) 103000
AA miles (myself) 102000
SouthWest Rapid Rewards 50000
AVIOS 50000 (and 50000 May 2013)
3X$400=$1200 in AA vouchers (expiry April 5 2013, that's when I have to book it by, right? Not travel?)
Delta $99 companion voucher (with anniversary date in December)

Trips (travelling from IND, Indianapolis, possible CVG, DAY, ORD, SDF, LEX):
Still need one return trip from Cabo on Jan 2, 2013
Big Island HI July 2013 (4 tickets)
Europe (HAJ or HAM) in summer 2013 (3 tickets)
Southern CA or Caribbean (possibly Aruba, St Lucia, St. Martin…) for Thanksgiving week 2013 - 4 tickets

So, how do I use it best?

Hey guys. Been lurking the forum for a while gathering information so I didn't sound like I'm here asking everything to be fed to me. Basically, I'm just looking for some advise on what would be the best way for me to maximize my miles and use as little out of pocket as necessary. I don't have a lot of miles, haven't churned much yet ;), but would like to use what I have wisely.

What I have currently:
leftover Delta SkyMiles (DH) 35088
leftover Delta SkyMiles (myself) 2392
AA miles (DH) 103565
AA miles (myself) 102961
SouthWest Rapid Rewards 50148
AVIOS 50000 (and 50000 May 2013)
3X$400=$1200 in AA vouchers (expiry April 5 2013, that's when I have to book it by, right? Not travel?)
Delta $99 companion voucher (with anniversary date in December)

Trips (travelling from IND, Indianapolis, possible CVG, DAY, ORD, SDF, LEX):
Still need one return trip from Cabo on Jan 2, 2013
Big Island HI July 2013 (4 tickets)
Europe (HAJ or HAM) in summer 2013 (3 tickets)
Southern CA or Caribbean (possibly Aruba, St Lucia, St. Martin…) for Thanksgiving week 2013 - 4 tickets

So, how do I use it best?

First off, welcome to FT. I think your question has too many variables for anyone to give you a decent answer. What I would do first is to confirm with AA when the voucher expires. It may very well be that travel must be completed by April. If that's true, use it on the Cabo trip.

Unfortunately, your accounts each have too few miles for most of your trips. If you and your spouse get AA cards, you would each have >120,000 miles, enough for 2 trips each to Europe. You can use your Avios for short hop flights in Europe or perhaps to the Caribbean (flying on AA). If "Southern CA" is Southern California, you can use your Southwest points for that.

Given the amount of travel you plan, it is probably unrealistic to use miles for all of them. Focus on which will deliver the biggest bang for your buck--probably using the voucher first and getting miles to go to Europe.

Hey guys. Been lurking the forum...
3X$400=$1200 in AA vouchers (expiry April 5 2013, that's when I have to book it by, right? Not travel?)...

Correct, this is when you have to book it by, not travel by. However, you do have to mail in the vouchers and have them credited, which takes a couple weeks or more so I wouldn't cut it too close...though I'm 99% sure as long as it's postmarked by the 5th you're good.

you hope for lowest level awards for these trips, i assume & don't want to split the group on 2 carriers....

so, construct a table like trip 1... n k dl, xk aa yk etc....trip 2 ditto....might help in your calculations.....be sure to put in ests of this years flying & other mi earnings....

edit to add....if you have enough for the trips, start booking....of course, you will have to wait for wn, iirc....

or maybe, hire an award consultant...

agree with above that you have too many variables here...

What I'd do is price out all the trips in cash and work your way down the list from most expensive to least expensive making sure that you do use the vouchers at some point.

If you've been lurking then you should know the basics... with ORD being the OW hub city nearby, that's going to be your best bet for avios usage; I'd probably eye AA miles for the Europe trip; Southwest flies domestic only so looks like probably SoCal would be a good use for them, etc. Like I said though, personally, I'd start from top to bottom with which trips would cost the most in cash and try to get a decent redemption out of your miles somewhere--at least 1.5cpm if not 2.0.

To add a footnote to OP's post. I am wondering would a person be better buying a coach ticket and upgrading with miles to get the most bang for the buck and making use of small mileage accounts? Plus one would get credit for the miles flown to add back to the account. Is my thinking correct?

Please change all your miles to 106***. Spelling out the exact amount miles in a public forum may not be a good idea.

Thank you for your suggestions so far. Just to clarify: we are not at all opposed to splitting our group into 2 parties, had done it many times before. We can fly 3/1 or 2/2, no problem. Also, I realize I don't have enough points for all my travel (used a lot last year), and will have to "supplement" with cash, but was looking for any "tricks" and suggestions that you could offer.
For instance, I was thinking that for travel to Germany I should probably use 1+1 Delta companion ticket and have the third one booked with AA miles. For Hawaii, I could use Southwest to fly to LAX and AVIOS from there to Kona. That would leave me with some AA miles and AA voucher to use for Thanksgiving trip. Of course I can't use both on the same ticket, but could book one way travel with voucher and other return ticket with miles.
Another option: Use $1200 voucher to get to LAX and from there AVIOS to KOA, AA miles for Europe and combination of Delta companion ticket and Southwestern for Thanksgiving.
What do you think?
And by the way, why posting exact numbers of miles is not a good idea? Too late now, because although I changed it in my post I can't change it in a quoted one.