Seems like everybody makes altogether too big a deal about where everyone is on Christmas morning. Happy, mature families adjust to travel and in-law complications at holidays without it becoming a drama-fest.
The solution is for heel and his wife to ensure they have more kids than the SIL, so the attractive force of their grandkids (let’s call it G) is greater than theirs.
So heel, get busy making sure Gheel > GSIL
Yes, that’s the only rational solution. 
This is what I meant by no win for you. If friends (or relatives) are having relationship problems. and you take one side or the other, then they resolve it, one party thinks you’re a villain for taking the others side, and you lose. You end up with 2 less friends.
I’d take a much more passive role.
This isn’t Global Thermonuclear War, where the only winning move is not to play. It’s his wife and her family, the only winning move is to side with the wife.
It’s also true that the wife’s side appears to be the more reasonable one, the parents said they don’t want to move, that should be the end of it. Pressuring them to move and taking them on a trip to see a house in a place they don’t want to live is BS. I’m pretty sure the GPs can understand the concept that living near the grandkids means you get to see them more often.
It feels like russian heel is a little overboard in his frustration about a problem that really doesn’t have much to do with him. Sounds like this issue is more between his wife’s parents and their daughter.
Same area as russian heel’s family.
And at this point, when you said “Make it for them? HOW can YOU make it for them?” what did your SIL say?
And after your wife called your SIL and said “Stop trying to force Mom and Dad to move to bum fuck NY because they don’t want to go!” what did your SIL say?
I highly doubt those conversations took place. OP sounds more of the passive aggressive type.
I think it’s very much russian heel’s problem. It upsets his wife and then he gets to hear all about it.
Fair enough, but it’s not his wife’s problem if he’s being honest that their concern is really for her parents. If that’s the case, then let them deal with it. They have kids, they are well familiar with compromises and dealing with pressure. They can handle it.
But I think the OP’s concern (or maybe only his wife’s) is more selfish - they want her parents close by, maybe for easy visits, maybe for future babysitting. It doesn’t sound like OP/wife would be accepting if the parents decide to move, and have their own plans to be manipulative in that case. And that ain’t right either.
I hope the OP picks up on this too.
I didn’t read it that way at all. I’m not exactly a fan of russian heel :), but it sounds to me like his wife has legitimate concerns about the stress this places on her parents, for whom she cares deeply. Then, like I said, **russian heel **gets to hear about it and gets angry because he can’t do anything. That’s why he posted. He’s venting.
Sounds like an issue for Carolyn Hax. If parents don’t have the balls to tell their daughter that the topic is closed, then perhaps your wife can ask them whether she has their permission to tell her on their behalf and explicitly say it’s on their behalf. Then if she raises it again, you change the subject. Rinse and repeat.
TL;DR.
Your parents in law could be farther away from you and you’re not jumping at the chance? :dubious:
Ah, Okay Omar I see what you are saying.
My wife DID tell my SIL in response to her “If they won’t make a decision, I will” by kindly letting her know the parents do NOT want to move there, to which my SIL had no response. But SIL did last week, in her own passive-aggressive way, show the parents the house for sale, to which the parents said, no thank you. (Yes, PA is a contagion in my in-laws family)
This is the point In fear the SIL will play the no-grandkids card.
I appreciate those who tell me not to get involved. God bless her Helena recognizes once you marry into a family, that is not really an option. I have to hear about this every week and it is making my wife miserable. For me to try and NOT get involved, and ignore it , would IMO make me a bad husband if I at the very least did not give my wife support and advice.
UPDATE
SIL is coming home for Easter. In between now and then if Mrs. Russian Heel brings it up again, I’m going to advise here to ask for sit with her parents and SIL in the living room, away from all the OTHER family members, and make her position clear: parents DONT want to move. When they are in a situation where they are no longer able to care fro themselves, we will all sit down, as a family, and discuss options.a SIL does NOT have final say.
Until then, if parents decide to stay down here in PA, and visit once a month or so like the usually do, how is that going to be a problem?
I agree with the one poster: its time to end the conversation, or every time my SIL engages with my in-laws, it will go around in circles again.
Time to nip it in the bud.
I may be the 1 in a 100 husbands that actually like their in-laws! 
My father-in-law is cool, we got to sports events together, and he’s taken me hunting.
My mother-in-law is a great cook and very nice lady.
Plus, them moving away might mean me having to drive my wife 4 hours every other weekend to see them, or being away from her when she does so. So no, ha ha I am not looking to exile my mother-in-law.
Do you think Id come up with this abortion of a thread if I hated them? :D:D:D
Now THAT is brilliant.
Especially when I said I get along with my sister-in-law, and she and her family DO visit PA a few times a year.
Now, did you think this one up on your own? I can understand however if others helped you out with it, because it was so brilliant. I can see how that creative process transpired.
As a matter of fact, it is so well done, I bet you spent the whole night thinking it up.
Thanks so much for posting this. No one here can wait for you next brilliant contribution.
Well then talk to your wife and figure out why it bothers her so damn much, from what you are writing the only person who wants them to move is the SIL. Why would her parents choosing to move bother her so much? Is a 4 hour drive too far for love to overcome?
What ‘support and advice’ do you give your wife? That somehow your in-laws choosing to move is fucking with you and your wife? That coming up with plans to involve the kids is somehow ‘Fuckin Awesome’? That forcing a conversation between family members, but only the Important Ones, and having the In-Laws tell SIL to FUCK OFF BITCH is a Good Thing?
How are your in-laws being manipulated? By being forced to choose to live at home? Didn’t they say no to a house near the SIL? Isn’t that the opposite of manipulation?
If the in-laws do choose to move how is that a problem for you and your wife? I bet there are sports shit, hunting shit and your mom-in-law won’t lose her ability to cook if they move. What is there to lose other than 8 hours of driving round trip?
Why do you keep bringing up ‘when they can’t care for themselves’? Are they suspiciously close to not being able to choose if they do want to move?
IMHO this all reads as;
SIL: Awesome Parents will move closer to me because we want it so!
In-Laws: No thanks
Russian Heels: Awesome Parents will stay because we want it so!
In-Laws: Our kids are mostly pretty smart. Mostly.
The wife has to realize that one of these days, for one reason or another, the parents are not going to be there and she has to deal with it. Hopefully OP will realize that ‘support and advice’ is more than feeding the wife’s rage by coming up with war plans and wanting to punch walls during a conversation.
The in-laws are fucking adults, let them be adults. Maybe the rest of the family can be adult-ish as well.
I wonder what they’ll do if the in-laws decide to become snow-birds and move to Florida! :eek:
The grandparents should have powers of attorney to preclude the evil daughter’s involvement in their affairs.