Michelle Obama, who has asserted the “right to bare arms” in high fashion during the first month-and-a-half as first lady, says the White House has its advantages.

“If you want pie, there’s pie!” the first lady of Washington tells the first lady of daytime TV, Oprah Winfrey. “If something breaks, it’s fixed. In an hour.”

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The April issue of O, The Oprah Magazine, with First Lady Michelle Obama on the cover, will available on March 17.

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(The pie in the White House, Winfrey reports, “is dangerously good.”)

Yet the Obamas are mindful, as they often note, that they are merely guests in the presidential residence. In the interview with Obama appearing in the April issue of O, on sale in mid-March, the first lady says: “We have the good fortune of being able to sleep here, but this house belongs to America.”

And the children, well they are to be treated like children.

“Not little princesses.”

From O … The Exclusive O Interview:

Our new First Lady on the surprises of life in the White House (“If you want pie, there’s pie! If something breaks, it’s fixed. In an hour”) … the rules she’s laid down for Malia and Sasha (“I want the kids to be treated like children, not little princesses”) … and how she hopes to use “one of the best jobs in the world” to help women transform their lives. Here’s a sneak peek …

For all the majesty of the White House, the First Lady has already infused it with a palpable ease; her presence makes the place feel open and approachable. When we sit down to talk, she seems as relaxed as she did when I first interviewed her and her husband in their Chicago apartment in 2004. “This room has the best light in the house,” she tells me as we settle in, shoes off, on a comfortable sofa. “And there’s pie here, too. The pie in the White House is dangerously good.”

Oprah: So after the inauguration, what was your first weekend in the White House like?

Michelle Obama: Well, we still had family here, so it was almost like a wedding. A huge, very complicated wedding. The last visitors didn’t leave until Sunday. And then the first Monday was kind of weird. You know: Now we live here, and Barack is getting up and going to work, and it’s just us. This is our home now.

Oprah: I had heart palpitations coming through the White House gate, recognizing that this really is now your home. It’s the White House, and it’s your home.

Michelle Obama: And it’s a beautiful home. When you go out and come back, especially at night, with all the white lights on — it’s just beautiful. We feel privileged, and we feel a responsibility to make it feel like the people’s house. We have the good fortune of being able to sleep here, but this house belongs to America.

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