Christina Applegate Vacation Tips: How To Survive Family Road Trips With Kids

"Vacation" actress Christina Applegate is sharing some tips for families traveling wih little kids. The actress speaks from experience, as she has a 4-year-old daughter, Sadie, and has experienced the good and bad in going out of town with her.

Sharing her tips with Us Weekly, the actress said that she and Sadie take the public transport when they're traveling. "I want her to know what the real place is...even the stinky parts," she told the news outlet.

Christina also shared that as a child, she only took one trip outside of America. "My mom took me to Tijuana [Mexico, from Los Angeles] and we sang this really weird Carmen Miranda song [from A Date With Judy] the whole ride down there. That's all I remember from the trip!"

The actress also shared that whenever she's on vacation, she takes a break from everything, too, including cooking and cleaning the dishes. She prefers having a staff to cater to her family's whims, but if that gets too expensive, she can also rely on family members. "There's my daughter, my stepdaughter, her boyfriend, my husband, and myself. And so that I can lie down, I do bring a nanny. Because I need to lie down!"

Road trips with kids can be stressful and hectic for parents, but even the children have some pet peeves about this, too. In a survey conducted by Ford in Europe, the kid's main complaints include enduring their parents singing, or seeing that their moms and dads are shouting at other drivers on the road, according to CNN.  The survey also revealed that many of the children are given snacks, smartphones or movies and TV so that they would behave in the car, according to Motoring World.  

Meanwhile, surviving road trips with kids has to do with a lot of planning and preparation and if the trips are long, parents must make sure to make the necessary stops along the way. "Plan to stop at a neighborhood park or someplace where the kids can run and blow off steam at least once every two to three hours," said travel site editor Mark Sedenquist via PBS.

"Stop at places and pick up a sticker or something small and then scrapbook as you go," shared another editor, Sheri Wallace. "It unifies everyone and instead of focusing on the getting there, you focus on the now."