This is my first posting but I think I may be of help. You can try the MR to SEA that I did last weekend. I flew out of MKE cause the price was cheaper plus I got extra miles that way. For example, you can try MKE-ORD-DFW-SEA-DFW-MKE on Dec 5th. It gets you 10946 DEQM for $237.50 which is about 2.2 cpm. This itinerary has you in the air constantly but there are options for spending an afternoon in Seattle before flying back or you can also spend the night and fly back on Dec 6th. It was my first MR and though it was a bit grueling on me I got to spend the afternoon with friends, have some good seafood and gained 10K DEQM for my troubles. You can even lower your costs by using a discount code like the one provided on aa.com/soccer since this itinerary is considered a round-trip ticket. This is my first posting so please let me know if my math is off.