I should also note that it was well within my right to move away from them first. So I guess I should have been ok if my wife did not want to take those trips to?
Are you saying your wife isn't allowed to form her own independent opinions of anything you do and that you should be able to act with impunity rather than form compromises? I still don't understand what's unreasonable about her point of view.
there was compromise. We stayed in the area we live in now to be close to her family. It was not my preferred location. Her compromise should be to take the trip to visit my family. I think that is quite fair.
It sounds like traveling for fun is important to her just as living near family is. Visiting your family is, rightly, important to you. Seems like the best compromise, then, would be to work together to find something else you can cut to balance the budget and still be able to visit your family as well as have vacations to new places.
Or, well...you are wanting an annual trip to see your parents. My question is, what is your budget, and how much vacation do you have?
We were visiting both our families annually, then we had kids. Then we cut it back a couple of times. Now we visit both families every two years. So we take one trip for 2 weeks and see both families. The opposite years, we go on a vacation.
So. If you have the vacation to take two one-week trips a year, but only the budget for one, then consider alternatives. Visit your family every year, and then go camping for your vacation one year and save up for a nice vacation the next.
If your time off or budget doesn't work for that, then consider visiting your parents as a family every OTHER year, and maybe you visit (alone or with the kids) every year. Nowhere does it say that you can't take a week and go visit your parents with your kids and leave your wife to go to a spa with a friend or something.