Maryland Family’s Easter Egg Hunt Ends With $50,000 Lottery Win

A Maryland family’s unique Easter tradition paid off big time this year. 

Melissa Blessing’s family’s annual Easter egg hunt includes eggs and… lottery tickets. 

“We all like scratch tickets,” the 911 operator from Havre de Grace explained to Maryland lottery officials this week. “And, since there are no kids involved in our gathering, they make great replacements for candy.” 

Each of Blessing’s family members bring instant tickets to the party, separate them randomly into groups, and assign each a number. Each hidden egg is then numbered, with the corresponding scratch-offs going to the finder. 

“The most I’ve ever won was $2, but I keep buying them because I really enjoy playing,” she said. 

As her family scratched their prizes at the end of this past Sunday's hunt, Blessing got to work on a $5 Money Money Money scratch-off. She was stunned by what she uncovered.

“I saw the match and must have read over the instructions five times,” she recalled. 

Unable to believe that she was holding a $50,000 top-prize win, Blessing asked her family to confirm that what she was seeing was true. After checking with the Maryland Lottery app, there was no denying her winnings.

“I still can’t believe this has happened,” Blessing said. “As we were all leaving, everyone was saying that this was an Easter we’ll be talking about for years.”

Blessing plans to pay bills and do some traveling with the proceeds from her big Easter prize.

Congratulations!