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Today is the White House's annual Easter Egg Roll, which means one thing: PARTY! Entertainment includes performances by Sara Bareilles, Yo Gabba Gabba, the cast of "Glee," Justin Beiber, Sesame Street, Billy Jonas, and stories read by Reese Witherspoon, Betty DeGeneres (Ellen's mom), Mariska Hargitay, Marian 'First Granny' Robinson, JK Rowling, Dylan Sprouse, Cole Sprouse, and Apolo Ohno. Read more about the Easter Egg Roll HERE.
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Pool report #3:
After the first family finished rolling eggs, your pooler was brought to the White House basketball and tennis courts.
Your pooler counted 17 kids shooting baskets and six "Baby Goes Pro" coaches helping them with their ball handling skills. One of the coaches was Delaney Rudd, formerly of the Utah Jazz.
According to the Baby Goes Pro website, "Baby Goes Pro was founded by two moms, championship tennis player Gigi Fernandez and Valerie Stern, a self-proclaimed "soccer mom," whose mission it was to introduce children to sports. With that in mind, they created Emkei the Monkey, an endearing animated character who teaches children the fundamentals of five sports -- baseball, tennis, basketball, golf and soccer. Together, they aim to teach children the benefits of leading an active lifestyle while inspiring a generation to move."
Rudd, Fernandez and Stern came over to chat with your pooler. They said the White House asked them to bring five sports -- basketball, tennis, soccer, baseball/softball, golf -- to the Easter event.
"We're just trying to inspire kids to move," said Stern.
"It's an incentive and initiative to get kids moving, same thing as the theme of today," said Rudd. "It's to get kids started playing sports."
POTUS arrived to lots of cheers. A blond girl threw him a basketball and he immediately began dribbling the ball back and forth between his legs. The blond girl managed to steal the ball back, and POTUS greeted the crowd.
"How is everyone doing today?" he asked. He walked around the court asking the kids names and shaking hands.
One parent on the sideline called out, "Hey Obama!" And then he went to go meet the parents and take photos.
POTUS got in line on the north side of the court, where kids were shooting free throws. POTUS's first shot bounced off the rim, a miss. He got back in line. And he sunk his second shot.
POTUS jogged over to the south side of the court to shoot some more free throws. He cheered the kids -- "Oh that's a good one!" -- and made a basket.
"I just want everyone to know I'm so excited to have you guys out here," he said. "I can see you have some great athletes on the court. Some of you are not much bigger than the ball, so it may be a little hard to reach right now, but stay with it. You guys are going to be terrific."
"Let's?" he encouraged the crowd ... "Move!"
POTUS jogged to the right corner, three point mark on the court. Attempt one, missed. (Oooh!) Attempt two, missed. (Owww!) Attempt three, swoosh. (Yaay!)
And he waved goodbye.
Pool report #2:
POTUS reads Dr. Seuss's "Green Eggs and Ham," (for obvious reasons, a favorite of your pooler's). About 25 children gathered around (they were warned before hand to "keep our tushies on the ground or in our seats") to hear POTUS read. When he turned to sit, Sasha had taken his seat but gave it up for her father."I guess they figured I'm too old, and I gotta sit down," he said.
POTUS noted the excercise theme of the day but told the kids "you've got to exercise your brain just like you exercise your body."
POTUS called "Green Eggs and Ham" "one of the classics, adding: "I'm going to try to do the best rendition ever of Green Eggs and Ham."
POTUS gestured wildly as he read and included the kids in a call-and-response type reading of the book.
After the lively reading, POTUS said the point of the book is to try your vegetables because you might like them.
"When your parents tell you to eat your broccoli, you don't know whether you're going to like them or not. You've got to try it," he said. "When your parents tell you to eat your peas, eat your peas."
POTUS got up to leave FLOTUS and the first daughters to participate in another activity -- "I gotta go play basketball." FLOTUS began reading "another favorite in the Obama White House," "Horton Hatches the Egg."
Pool was escorted out and heading to the Nats game. Will be on jeans watch.
Remarks by the President and First Lady:
For Immediate Release April 5, 2010REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
AND THE FIRST LADY
AT THE 2010 WHITE HOUSE EASTER EGG ROLL
South Lawn
11:01 A.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: How about Amber? Please give Amber a big round of applause. (Applause.)
Is everybody having a good time? (Applause.) Happy Easter, everybody. We are thrilled that all of you could come. I'm not going to make a long speech, because we've got the best speaker, the smartest and best-looking of the older Obamas -- (laughter) -- and that would be the First Lady of the United States, Michelle Obama. (Applause.)
MRS. OBAMA: Hey, everybody! (Applause.) Is this not the most perfect day for the Easter Egg Roll? (Applause.) Let's say thank you to Mother Nature, yeah! (Applause.)
You guys, we are so excited to have you. Welcome to the 2010 Easter Egg Roll. The theme for this year's event is "Ready, Set" what?
AUDIENCE: Go!
MRS. OBAMA: Go! And as you guys know, this year I launched a nationwide initiative to try to end the epidemic of childhood obesity. It's called "Let's Move." And today we have transformed the South Lawn into a playground. And our hope today is that in addition to having fun and doing some of the traditional activities like the egg roll and the Easter egg hunt, that you can learn about beginning to live a more healthy life.
We've got wonderful food stands over in the back. We've got some of the area's and the nation's best chefs. You can learn to cook. There's a farmers market. You can see the garden.
But we also have some great activities. We've got several athletic centers. We've got football, we've got basketball. (Applause.) We've got tennis, we've got yoga. And we have some of the most phenomenal athletes here. We've got our Washington Redskins here. (Applause.) We have Olympians -- Apolo Ohno. We've got Billie Jean King. (Applause.) In the center we're going to have some dancing, some hula-hooping. We've got DJ Tony from the Ellen DeGeneres Show who's going to do some stuff. (Applause.) And then if that's not enough, you can go over to the music stage and just have some fun with Justin Bieber. (Applause.) You guys know Justin Bieber? (Applause.) You've heard of Justin Bieber? (Applause.) Well, he's here. (Applause.)
And we have Sara Bareilles, one of my favorites; the cast of Glee. (Applause.) Yay! And thank you, Amber, for that wonderful rendition of the national anthem. (Applause.)
And then we've got readers. There's always -- reading is important. We've got J.K. Rowling, one of our favorite authors here. (Applause.) Reese Witherspoon. We've got tons of people who are here just to have fun with you guys today.
So the only thing you need to do is get ready, set, and do what?
AUDIENCE: Go!
MRS. OBAMA: One thing I want to do -- I want to thank all of the volunteers who helped put this thing together. Everyone, our volunteers working all weekend, setting up this amazing event.
I want to thank our staff, Ellie Schafer. Ellie! (Applause.) And Joe Reinstein for putting this together. They have done just an amazing job. We are thrilled to have you here. We're going to have 30,000 people in our backyard today, and we want every single one of you to have fun, to think about living a healthy life, and to get moving.
So with that, we're going to go over and we're going to do a little Easter egg rolling. We're going to do a little reading. So we look forward to seeing you all.
Have fun, and thank you for being here. (Applause.)
Pool Report #1 at 11:15:
News -- potus is wearing khakis and blue gingham shirt. No word on whether he'll change to jeans before this afternoon's game.First family, including first grandmother, emerged onto the balcony at 10:56. Remarks are provided by the WH and should come shortly.
Potus spoke briefly so that he could give way to "the smartest and best looking of the older Obamas" -- flotus.
Flotus said they were expecting 30,000 people "in our backyard today."