in our case we are long standing members of the Alaska Airline's skymiles program and I was less than 2000 miles away from a free ticket. Erin had enough for a free ticket and then some and so she sent her extra miles to me (it's a new program AK Air has) there's a small fee to send miles to another person and so that's where 35 dollars of the 55 came from (the other 20 was the 10 bucks each ticket cost in taxes)....
one place I like to use to watch for low airfare is sidestep.com it watches all of the airlines you like to fly for you and lets you know weekly what the prices are.
I just got a great deal!!!! Flights for our family of 5 for $8.00each!!!!! My in-laws moved to Myrtle Beach, SC and we were looking for a way to visit this summer....we are flying from Atlantic City, NJ to Myrtle Beach on Spirit Airlines. They do however have seat fees, luggage fees, but even after all the taxes and fees it comes to 28.00 per person each way!! We couldn't drive there & back for that with the gas prices!!! Mind you Atlantic City is a 5 hour drive for us, but our flight doesn't leave until 7:00pm so we have plenty of time to get there...no renting hotel rooms ...so it looks like it'll work out fine!!!