I think she's just proud of our accomplishments, and with her everything is a big deal or production. That means that when we buy a new house she needs to show everyone it so that it's a big deal. She stopped but is still acting hurt over it like two years later.
It's just tough because she extremely intense emotionally. Everything is dramatic. If we come over for dinner it's a big production, if we go out to dinner it's a big production. Shit, I've seen her cry because she was hugged. The problem is that these very behaviors prevent people from doing what she wants because they don't want her to make a big deal out of it.
She recently started a conversation on the phone with me about how we don't come over much any more so I finally laid it out for her. I basically said that she behaves like we're acquaintances, not family. Going to visit them means a big production, a lot of times you don't feel like a big production so you hang out with family and friends because it's easy and comfortable. I explained to her that making a big production of, say, my birthday when I don't want one makes me dread having to go over for my birthday. Her explanation there is that SHE would want a big birthday - so I have to ask her if my birthday is about what she would want in my situation or what I would want?
When it comes down to it, her decisions are always made based on what she would want. She never stops to think what the other person wants. They're still being made with a good heart, but she just doesn't get that not everyone wants exactly what she wants....and she wants everything in her life to be a big deal and production. That means if you come over for dinner, it's a big deal. If you give her a hug goodbye it's a big deal because that hug means so much. etc etc. It's tough to combat that - so we just avoid it. Hopefully the recent conversation will make her tone things back, but she's never had to in the past. Last I heard was that she was frustrated because none of her old friends would go hiking with her anymore - I didn't say it but my guess is that it was just too much of a production and they didn't want to go through it.
In my experience, she'll push things until there's some sort of blow up or conversation...get better for a while...then slowly forget. During this conversation I agreed to a clean slate but reminded her that everything she does is writing on that clean slate, so she still has to change otherwise we'll just go back to how things were.
I would also note that it's not like they don't see us. They live 20-30 minutes away and we see them a couple times a month. Sometimes less if our lives get really busy.