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Here’s a little positivity.

A single mother of four is still reeling from being the winner of what officials are calling the largest Powerball win in North Carolina history. And Marie Holmes, 26, knows exactly what to do with the $127 million she’s taking home.

Give her kids the world.

“This is going to make a huge difference for them,” Holmes said of her children at a press conference. “They’re going to be able to live a comfortable life and not worry about struggling.”

Holmes, mother to three girls and a son suffering from cerebral palsy, previously worked at fast food chains and retailers to support her Shallotte, NC-based family. But she didn’t know that was all going to change the day she asked her mother to pick up a Quick Pick lottery ticket.

In fact, Holmes wasn’t even aware that she was the winner until the next day when a friend posted the lottery numbers online. That’s when the shock set in.

“I scared my kids because I was jumping up and down in the house,” she said, beaming on Monday after North Carolina lottery officials handed over a giant check with her name on it as confetti rained down from the ceiling.

 

Their startled reaction was just the first of many ways Holmes said her children — ages 7, 4, 3 and nine months — are going to see their lives change because of the prize, she said.

 

[…]

 

Holmes told CNN affiliate WECT last week that she thought she was going to have a heart attack when she found out she’d won.

 

“I don’t know if I want to cry, smile, what, I’m just grateful for this moment. I’m thankful that I can bless my kids with something that I didn’t have,” she said.

And the money is already changing their lives. Holmes, who was living with seven of her family members, hopes to get each of them a home of their own.

Since the day earlier this month when she realized she’d won, Holmes said her life has already changed. She was sandwiched between a lawyer and financial adviser as she accepted her winnings Monday. Security, she said, now has to accompany her whenever she goes outside — something she’s still adjusting to. She told reporters Monday she wants to keep her kids out of the spotlight to make sure they’re safe.

She said she’s still consulting with advisers about how to spend the money, which she’s accepted in the $127 million lump-sum payment (totaling $87.9 million after taxes).. For now, she said she plans to donate to churches and cerebral palsy charities. She’s also hoping to travel, possibly leaving the United States for the first time to visit Paris. And she wants to go back to school.

The prize, she said, means everything to her as a mother.

“Anything my kids ask for, I can actually get it for them, and I don’t have to tell them, ‘no,'” she said.

Congratulations to the Holmes family.

SOURCE: CNN | VIDEO SOURCE: News Inc.