Natalie Carraway said her prize “is a blessing.”
North Carolina Education Lottery
Natalie Carraway recently predicted she was going to win the lottery.
“I kept saying I was going to win the $200,000,” she told officials, according to a Jan. 31 North Carolina Education Lottery news release. “I was adamant about it.”
Carraway, 46, and her daughter went to buy a Hot 5’s ticket at the Circle K on Carolina Beach Road in Wilmington. That’s where she learned her prediction came true: She won the top prize, officials said.
After seeing her prize on the scratch-off game, Carraway celebrated with her daughter and the store manager, she told officials.
“I just looked at her and started jumping up and down,” Carraway said. “And then I just started crying.”
The manager was excited about the win, too.
“He told me he wouldn’t have wanted it to happen to anyone else,” Carraway told officials.
After state and federal taxes, Carraway took home $142,501. She told officials the prize “couldn’t have come at a better time.”
“It is such a blessing,” she said.
Carraway said she plans to use her prize to pay bills, do some renovations and buy a car.
Moira Ritter covers real-time news for McClatchy. She is a graduate of Georgetown University where she studied government, journalism and German. Previously, she reported for CNN Business.
