How does it feel to sleep on $150,000? Ask Shawn and Laurel Wittke of Elkin who stuck their $150,000 lottery ticket between their mattresses for safekeeping Wednesday night after Shawn brought home a winner.
Shawn started the day by buying two $5 Casino Riches tickets at the Market Basket on N.C. 268 in Wilkesboro, one for himself and one for his wife. He said he’s usually lucky with the lottery, but when he scratched his ticket he didn’t see any prizes.
That night, Shawn gave the second ticket to his wife to scratch. “I looked at it, and said ‘No way,’’’ she recalled Thursday. “I handed it to Shawn and said, ‘Am I looking at this right?’”
A quick trip to the nearest store confirmed she was. “We stuck it between our bed mattresses so it wouldn’t disappear,” said Shawn.
The couple said they rent their home now, but their good luck means they can buy their first home, pay off their bills, and take their children to Disney. After the required state and federal tax withholdings, they received $103,876.
“So we’re going to buy us a retirement home at 45 and 47,” said Shawn, a maintenance worker at W. Kerr Scott Dam and Reservoir. “And when we do retire, we won’t have to worry about anything. We’re going to make our retirement easy.”
The couple won the last of four $150,000 prizes in the game. Since all top prizes are won, the lottery will end the game.
Ticket sales from games like Casino Riches made it possible for the lottery to raise more than half a billion dollars for the state last year. For details on how over $30.6 million in lottery funds has made a difference in Surry County, click on the “For Education” section of the lottery’s website.