We celebrated my father-in-law’s 90th birthday last week with a family party. After watching a DVD showing scenes from his very long life we entered into all the usual party activities.

Daughter number three was in charge of producing the film and she was faced with two main problems; first, how do you condense the best part of a century into five minutes? That’s less than four seconds per year.

Second, his first 50 years were lived before video cameras were readily available.

During his lifetime he has witnessed more than a few changes.

I asked him what he remembers most vividly. He spoke excitedly about getting a colour TV for the first time. Most of the neighbours came in to check out what life would look like when not seen in black and white.

He has since kept up with technology and proudly owns a mobile phone.

When producing the celebratory movie, daughter number three was, however, able to use some very old cine footage. Some family members had bought the equipment between them back in the Sixties to record family holidays.

Every year they would set off for North Wales during what was known as Wakes Week, where each town would have a shut-down period when all the mills and factories would close.

Rhyl, Llandudno and Prestatyn were all chosen destinations as centres of family fun.

Then, one year, the family branched out and decided to visit Cornwall. This must have seemed a huge decision considering they were about to travel more than 300 miles as opposed to the usual 70.

Some of the journey was captured on film and it was amusing that most of the adults were dressed up for the coach journey. These were ordinary working-class folk who laboured hard all year in overalls and boiler suits.

They marked their holiday with a sense of occasion by wearing more formal clothes.

We watched the DVD with lots of laughter and a few tears as we remembered those who were no longer with us. Getting to 90 means that father-in-law has outlived most of his contemporaries.

During the evening he seemed content and happy. He insisted that no-one buy him any presents. He repeated to everyone that he was at the age where he didn’t need anything new.

Of course, no-one listened and he ended up with £300 in cash and £200 in gift vouchers. Added to this was the wide range of alcoholic beverages that had been given as presents.

It was only at the end of the evening that we realised that no-one had brought a video camera for the occasion.