Dream come true for Lottery winner
Wednesday, May 02, 2007 posted 10:36 AM EDT
A laundry worker was today planning her first holiday abroad for nearly 30 years after winning the National Lottery.
Joanne Gilbert, 47, from Abertillery, South Wales, will use part of her £1,146,172 jackpot winnings to realise a childhood dream of visiting Disneyland in America.
Ms Gilbert, who is single and works at the laundry of Llanfecha Grange Hospital in Cwmbran, South Wales, first realised she had become a millionaire while holidaying with her five-year-old grandson, Rhys, at her caravan in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset.
Her six numbers – 11, 17, 24, 28, 41, and 47 – came up during Saturday night’s Lotto draw.
"The Lotto draw was happening on the TV, so I decided to get a pen and paper to check the numbers," said Ms Gilbert, who has a 31-year-old son called Marcus.
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"All of a sudden I realised I’d written down all six of my regular numbers.
"I know them off by heart, as I’ve been playing with those numbers since the lottery started – I chose them from a mixture of family birthdays.
"I play without fail every single week, even if it’s the last pound in my purse.
"I went to see my friends, Kay and Tony, who stay in the caravan pitch next to mine, and we all just stood there looking at the ticket in disbelief.
"The win still hasn’t sunk in, and I’ll need to think very carefully about what I want to do with the money, but one thing that has always been at the top of my list is a trip to Disneyland in America – I’m a big kid really.
"My mum and dad are so pleased and excited for me, the whole thing is just unbelievable."
Ms Gilbert, who said she has not decided whether to quit her job, has vowed to remain at her house in the former mining community where she lives.
"I will stay where my roots are," she said. "I’m quite content where I am."
Her father, Lionel Strickland, said: "It is something that we have always wanted, for Joanne to be settled.
"This, I think, will make her future secure. We will keep her feet firmly on the ground and she will make her trip to America which she has always wanted since she was 12.
"Circumstances haven’t been right for her but she will certainly have her trip of a lifetime."
The Gwent area of Wales has seen five jackpot winners in the last year, three them in the last three months.
The last winner, Jennifer Southall, a single mother of three from the Ringland Estate in Newport, won £8,372,751 in the Easter Saturday Lotto draw.
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