Sometimes I am simply amazed how thing work out, and how miles and points allow our family to do the impossible. If you read InACents, you know by making a couple of strategic moves over the past couple of months, as well a year or so of saving miles and rewards, we have now been able to score flights to Hawaii for our family for only $30 and Continental Airline miles. Then, just last week we were able to use our bounty of Priority Club Rewards to score 7 free nights while in Oahu for FREE saving our family over $1,150! In addition, we opened new Continental credit cards last month (1 personal/1 business for me; and 1 personal for my wife), netting us over 135,000 miles. So what should we do?

Well after some thought of spending two plus weeks in the Hawaiian Islands, I was personally a little bit worried about those times when I wanted to go off snorkeling with the wife with two little boys sitting on the beach. While I think Bug (2-year old) would have good intentions of watching Shark (10-month old) alone, I somehow figure one of them would end up with sand in his eye, not to mention seeing us on the local news as “those parents” who left their kids alone on the beach. It is not my idea of a well thought out vacation, and I really want to be able to explore the ocean a couple of times with my wife.

All the while we have been planning for our trip to the Land of Aloha, my in-laws have been carefully trying to figure out how they too can partake in the adventure. The big problem…they are not as point savvy yet as we are, and we are hoping by them seeing how all these free miles and points allow us to Save Money, Travel More, that they too will start to see the light and listen more closely when I talk about opening a new credit card (or two, or three, or…).

So without the use of a mountain of miles or points burning a hole in their pockets, they have to shell out the old, hard cash. That is great and all, but when you are looking at a two week vacation in Hawaii, you are looking at nothing short of $5,000, and that is just for flights, hotels, and vehicles. It is an expensive proposition. Therefore, my wife and I began to start thinking outside of the box.

We are fortunate to have already scored free flights and hotels for part of the vacation. Currently the only “hard” expense will be nights on the Big Island, vehicles, and inter-island flights unless I can figure out a way to use points from other programs. So I approached my wife with a plan.

What if we could pay for the flights going to Hawaii, and in return, maybe we cost share, or her parents cover some of the expenses on other aspects of the trip? Sounds good in theory, right? But there is still the logistics of getting another set of flights during the same weeks we will be in Hawaii. And there was nothing we could do until all the miles posted to our Continental accounts from opening the credit cards. However, in the meantime, we approached my wife’s parents with a proposed plan.

After some thought, they agreed provided their portion of the trip was only 9 days (2 days of traveling to and from, and 7 days on the islands). Sweet, I can work with that.

Then fast forward to yesterday, and the miles just so happen to post to both of our accounts! Now I have options. So even though I have been watching the reward flight options for weeks, I decided to run some itineraries to see what I could find, only to about fall out of my chair.

After weeks, if not months of searching for our own flights, there they were sitting all pretty and waiting to be booked. Two tickets out of Cleveland (we have to get all the way to Chicago for our flights) to Hawaii exactly straddling our time between Oahu and the Big Island. Really, is it my early Christmas present all over again?

Off to call the in-laws to make sure they are ok with the days and times. Check. Back to my desk to quickly book them before my miracle disappears. Check. Quick call them back up and get their OnePass account numbers. Check. Ta-da! 80,000 miles later and $15 in fees later, and we just scored babysitting in Hawaii for 7+ days! Have fun with the boys grandma and papa, as my wife and I are going out to dinner and swimming to a secluded island somewhere!

That, ladies and gentleman is exactly why I love the mileage and points game!