Charles and Cassie Kelley Welcome Son Ward Charles

Lady Antebellum has officially grown by one.

Charles Kelley and his wife Cassie welcomed their first child, son Ward Charles Kelley, on Thursday morning, Feb. 11, they announced through her women’s lifestyle website, Womanista.

Born at 9:20 a.m. in Nashville, Ward weighed in at 7 lbs., 9 oz. and measured 20 inches long.

“We can’t stop staring at him and he hasn’t stopped chitchatting with us since he arrived,” Cassie tells Womanista. “He’s got momma’s nose and daddy’s eyes and vocal chords and a head full of blond hair.”

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Prior to the birth, Kelley, whose new song “The Driver” with Dierks Bentley earned him a Grammy nomination for best country duo/group, told PEOPLE he wanted Ward’s name to be “something different.”

He added, “most of the names on my side of the family are taken, so we found a really cool name that we both like on her side of the family.”

While Kelley, 34, admitted that Ward isn’t “as out there as Apple,” he told PEOPLE that the name is “not standard.”

“We wanted something unique and special,” Kelley said.

Womanista

After announcing her pregnancy last summer, Cassie revealed that the couple had long struggled to conceive.

“Many months went by with negative pregnancy tests and a lot of shared frustration … We went through several years of trying before finally seeing our fertility doctor in Nashville this past November,” she wrote on Womanista.

“When all was said and done, our doctor informed us that we had about a 1 percent chance of conceiving a child naturally. Yeah. 1 percent.”

She continued, “We never stopped hoping though … We made a plan to regroup this fall and explore other options to expand our family. Then it happened. I woke up one morning in June and there it was, a positive pregnancy test. I was in shock. Happy shock, but shock.”

— Lindsay Kimble with reporting by Danielle Anderson