By Natalie Demaree

A Maryland nurse noticed an interesting pattern in her lottery plays over the past five years: she’s won big three times when playing in mid-April, lottery officials said.

The latest win for the Owings Mills woman happened earlier this month when she won $50,000 from a Money Bags scratch off game, the Maryland Lottery said in an April 22 news release.

“I was thinking about my two biggest wins as we drove here today and realized that both of them were in April!” the woman told lottery officials when she claimed her prize. “Now a third. That’s crazy.”

What’s more is each win seems to increase, she said. Five years ago she won $10,000 in April, then she won $20,000 two years ago.

“Every morning since then, I wake up and think for a moment that this has been a dream,” the woman told lottery officials. “And a moment later I smile knowing that it really did happen.”

The lucky player purchased her ticket for $10 in lieu of dessert during lunch with a friend at a deli in Dundalk, lottery officials said.

The odds of winning a prize in the Money Bags game, which started in February, are 1 in 3.5, according to the game’s web page.

Prizes range between $10 and $250,000, the lottery said.

Dundalk is about a 10-mile drive southeast from Baltimore.