I booked on Star Alliance: JFK-CAI-IST-MLE-MXP-EWR.
120,000 miles each for my wife and I, All biz class.

Flying Egyptair to Cairo, using the free *A stopover for 5 nights in Cairo, then off to Male via Istanbul on Turkish Air. 6 nights in the Maldives, then back to US on Turkish + United. 23 hour layover in Milan - just enough time for dinner :-)
I booked Star Alliance because Turkish just started flying IST to MLE. I saw a ton of availability open up in August and that inspired me to put the trip together.
For hotels - My wife and I opened up 3 Chase cards between us to gather the Hyatt points we needed. Now have six nights booked at the Park Hyatt. Was pretty straightforward, though waiting for the points to post seemed like an eternity! Hope this helps!