Breaking Ground on New Pickle Ball Courts - Phase 3 Amenities
Oct 25th, 2022

Pickleball for All!

New Pickleball Courts

If you haven’t heard, we’ve broken ground on our newest Phase 3 amenities, which include ten, that’s right TEN, brand new regulation-sized pickleball courts. This will more than double our number of courts from eight to eighteen! And four of these new courts will be covered with a high awning to protect players from the blazing sun. “Everyone is excited and grateful,” said Deb Pryor, President of the Kissing Tree Pickleball Association. “We have a first-class neighborhood; you feel like you live at a resort, and this will make it even more resort-like.”

The More the Merrier

We’re hoping these new courts will be finished in time for next year’s Kissing Tree Invitational, our annual pickleball tournament that welcomes players in the 50+ age brackets for a weekend of competition play. Our 2022 Invitational, held last month, was a great chance for residents and guests to connect and play ball.

This was our fourth (and largest) pickleball tournament ever, offering singles and doubles brackets for a full roster of age and skill levels. We had 226 athletes registered, and 408 matches were played! There were 224 medals awarded, with 35 going to KT residents. “It was amazing,” Deb said. “Almost all of our KT players won a medal, which shows how the program is growing and how competitive we are with the outside world. We’re such a new community, and to catch up, we’re doing a lot of good things, like our Intro to Pickleball Classes, which are free for all residents, and our new mentorship program.”

Wouldn’t be KT Without Good Eats!

Our opening night welcome party in Independence Hall continues to be a highlight of the weekend. This year, we had music from DJ Henry Williams and yummy eats including cheeseburger sliders, grilled veggie crostinis, mini street tacos, and a queso bar. There were also prizes and giveaways.

“We got rave reviews again this year,” Deb said. “We fed the athletes all day long in our hospitality tent, which had snacks including fresh fruit, bars, and baked goods from the community. We even had beef sticks for the keto people. And everyone got a boxed lunch from a local sandwich shop. We also ran a full first-aid tent with all the retired nurses in community, which was good because we had two heat exhaustion episodes!”

Can’t Wait for Next Year

We wanted to give a special thanks to our event sponsors: Pickleball Rocks, Pickleball Giant, Bev & Liv’s Sports Boutique, and NB Cryotherapy.

We’re also so grateful for all the Kissing Tree employees and volunteers who worked so hard to make this event possible by refilling water jugs, updating brackets, running scores, manning the registration table, and so many other critical jobs. “The support of Kissing Tree has been phenomenal,” Deb said. “We couldn’t ask for more than what they do for us. People are so generous with their work and their time. The maintenance people and grounds people did double duty for this tournament; they work so hard. And we had 89 volunteers! It’s a lot of moving pieces coming together. We’ve been very blessed.”

Want to come play with us at next year’s tournament? We don’t know exact dates yet, but we’ll have the listing up http://www.pickleballtournaments.com when it gets closer. In the meantime, Kissing Tree residents are welcome to check out our classes and get togethers—check the HOA events calendar for more details. If you aren’t a resident yet, find your dream home and come join us!

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