First Look: Michelle Obama’s New Book, “American Grown,” Plus Her Notes On Being A Mom

First Lady, First Mom and First Fly Girl Michelle Obama is about to be a first-time author—and MyBrownBaby has your first look at her new book!

American Grown: How the White House Kitchen Garden Inspires Families, Schools, and Communities, tells the story of the edible White House kitchen garden Michelle planted on the South Lawn—a project she says was inspired by her daughters, Sasha and Malia, and her family’s desire to change its eating habits. Through telling the story of the garden, Michelle, a passionate advocate for healthful eating and exercise and the creator of the landmark Let’s Move campaign to fight childhood obesity, explores how increased access to healthy, affordable food can promote better eating habits and improve health of families and communities across America. American Grown also includes recipes and gives tips and resources for how to create community, school and urban gardens, support local farmers’ markets and make small lifestyle changes to achieve big health results.

American Grown will be issued in both digital and print editions; the print edition will be a gorgeously illustrated, four-color hardcover that includes pictures of the White House garden and Mrs. Obama throughout the seasons, as well as other community and school gardens from around the country. American Grown goes on sale nationwide on April 10, 2012 from Crown Publishers.

And to add to the flyness: Michelle accepted no advance for the book and will donate all after-tax author proceeds to charity. Random House, Inc., the company that owns Crown, also will make a donation.

How can you not love this woman? I absolutely adore her passion, especially because it’s rooted in making sure her brown babies—and ours, too!—grow into healthy, smart, phenomenal human beings. It’s a passion every mom shares, for sure. But it takes on a whole ‘nother meaning for me when the humanness of motherhood comes packaged in the form of a woman, wife and mom who looks like my family and me. And in my mind, she can do no wrong.

Thing is, Michelle will be the first to admit she’s not perfect and that, like all of us, she worries incessantly about whether she’s getting it right. In a White House roundtable last week, Michelle told People magazine, “Like any mother, I am just hoping that I don’t mess them up.” She stressed that she’s doing her best to make Sasha and Malia’s life as normal as humanly possible by getting them out of the White House spotlight, limiting their time on the computer and in front of the TV (especially when it comes to Keeping Up With the Kardashians and other reality TV shows, which President Obama isn’t too keen on his girls watching), and paying attention to the things that matter in their lives, like school, friends and extracurricular activities. “It’s really the interaction that we have as a family that makes it feel like home,” she said. “It’s sitting down at the dinner table and having Barack’s day be the last thing anyone really cares about.”

And this makes her and the Obamas even more adorable.

Get it, Shelley!

For more MyBrownBaby stories and commentary on Michelle Obama, her work as a child advocate, and childhood obesity read:

• Our First Family
• Dear Michele Bachmann: Shut Up About Black Moms and Breastfeeding
• Candy Apples, 12-Inch Subs and Quarter Waters: 3rd Graders Lunches = One Step Closer To Type 2 Diabetes 
• Not All Sugar Is Sweet: 10 Great Tips For Staving Off Diabetes In Black Kids 
• {Dr. Ivor Is In} Generation XXL: Talking Childhood Obesity With Black Moms