The “Just Got Started Lovin’ You” singer and….are you ready?…the husband of the sister of the wife of Rascal Flatts’ Jay Demarcus, are the proud new parents of Ava Katherine, born Tuesday night.  James’ wife Amy is doing great.  Her sister, Alison DeMarcus, is also expecting so we’ll have some country cousins soon. (Does anyone else remember the restaurant in Hillsdale called The Country Cousin?  They had the world’s greatest crinkly fries.  Ooooh, yum.)  Anyway, congrats to James and Amy.

Rascal Flatts got together yesterday to make 2 announcements, and depending on your outlook, one was way bigger than the other. If you are a music biz person, then it was a huge deal to learn that RF has left Lyric Street records after 10-plus years to join Big Machine. This is a huge deal for several reasons, but mainly because a few years back, Big Machine was a small deal in Nashville. Then the owner, Scott Borchetta, signed a girl named Taylor Swift and everything changed very quickly. Now he’s got Taylor, Reba and Rascal Flatts on his label, which officially makes him The Man.

Secondly, if you’re keeping track of the country baby boom, you’ll be excited to hear that the last Flatt to replicate, Jay DeMarcus, says that the baby on the way is a girl! Weird country baby trivia: Jay’s wife has a sister named Amy, who is married to James Otto, and who is also expecting a girl. So the girls will be little country star cousins!

James Otto is on a Photoshop bender!  He’s been posting pics on Twitter all morning, but this one is my favorite:

Yep.  That’s James and Kellie Pickler.