If you're travelling over Thanksgiving on the high traffic days, then you can probably forget about getting an award ticket for under 50K and you're not going to want to wait around to see if it comes up anyway. Your alternative plan sounds like a hassle and what is your family doing in the meantime? Although I've never tried to book it from Detroit over Thanksgiving, Orlando is generally not a very expensive destination and so it may not be a great choice for an award ticket unless you really have to do it. Moreover, if YOU are the biggest mileage earner in your family, you want to put your lowest mileage earner on the award ticket so you keep earning miles. It could well be better to save your miles for a time when you are looking at a higher avoided cost and a standard award (or two).