RALEIGH – Audrey Childers of Mount Holly, a school bus driver and substitute teacher, says the $283,484 she won playing Carolina Cash 5 will help her buy a new home for her family.

“It’s wonderful,” Childers said as she collected her winnings with her husband and three daughters. “I’m in a dream. I can’t believe it. I told my husband I was going to win. Now he believes me.”

Childers had one of two winning tickets that split a $566,968 Cash 5 jackpot in the Saturday, Feb. 11 drawing. She bought the ticket along with Powerball tickets on Friday, Feb. 10, when she stopped to buy gas at the Westview Grocery on Catawba Avenue in Mount Holly.

A week later, she stopped at the store again to buy gas and asked the retailer to check her tickets to see if she had won anything. She said the clerk told her one of the winning tickets had been purchased at the store and after checking hers announced, “This is the winning ticket.” The announcement led to Childers and her family jumping into their car to drive to lottery headquarters in Raleigh.

Childers’ share of the jackpot was $283,484. After taxes were withheld, she received $192,770.

“We’re going to buy a house,” Childers said. “We’ve been saving up. So now we can buy a house.”

The other winner of the jackpot was Steve Kidd of Ramseur in Randolph County. He claimed his share on Monday, Feb. 13.

Through June 30 of last year, Gaston County players won more than $75 million in lottery prizes and local retailers earned more than $9.3 million in commissions on ticket sales. During the same time frame, Gaston County education programs received more than $44.8 million in lottery funds. By law, those funds pay for teachers’ salaries in grades K-3, school construction, need-based college scholarships and prekindergarten programs for at-risk four-year-olds.

To date, the N.C. Education Lottery has raised more than $2.2 billion for these initiatives statewide.