THE local community has rallied together to raise money for the Brown family after four-year-old, Tex, was badly burnt in a terrible accident two weeks ago.

A GoFundMe page set up by family friend, Jess Martin, has raised over $4400 for the family to help cover ongoing medical bills and travel to and from the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH).

In addition to this, PJ’s Playhouse is organising a ‘Dance for Tex Disco’ on Thursday, January 19, with proceeds to go to the Brown family.

It has been a nightmare period for the family since disaster struck on December 29, when the family was sitting around a fire and Tex tripped and fell, suffering significant burns to his hands, right hip and ankles, as well as minor burns to the majority of his body.

Parents, Ebony and Luke, took Tex to the Hamilton Base Hospital where he was treated, but after getting an infection, he was airlifted to the RCH.

The four-year-old underwent surgery and has since been taken back and forth to the RCH for further treatment and surgeries.

The Brown family is staying in high spirits while supporting not only Tex, but also their other two beautiful children, Olive and Harlow.

Family friend, Jess Martin, made the decision to create a GoFundMe page on January 3 to help support the family with the ongoing strain of medical bills and travel.

“I had obviously been speaking to Ebony and felt like I wanted to help in some form of way, obviously everyday living is expensive enough let alone when something like this occurs,” she told The Spectator.

“I didn’t really have an expectation (when I set up the GoFundMe page), I think people put themselves in their (the family’s) shoes and are like what if this happened to me … so I think you find people are quite generous especially when it comes to things like this.

“The first day I was absolutely blown away, people had seen it and were sharing it and it just sort of took off and its obviously reached over $4000 now which is amazing.”

Jess said that owner of PJ’s Playhouse, Laura Reid, contacted her about organising the fundraiser which would see all ticket revenue going towards supporting Tex and his family.

Dance for Tex Disco will go ahead on January 19 from 4-7.30pm at PJ’s Playhouse located at 43 Cox Street, with tickets able to be purchased from a link on PJ’s Playhouse Facebook page or at the door on the night if availability allows.

A dance floor will be set up with plenty of colourful lights and the kids will be able to run between dancing and the playground for the night.

“Laura messaged me and was like I want to do something, let’s do something else, my husband and I run a small business called ‘Something Extra Hire’, which is just party hire, music, speakers … I said we will donate the equipment and make it happen,” Jess said.

PJ’s Playhouse owner, Laura Reid, came up with the idea for the fundraiser and was glad to be using her facility to contribute to such a worthy cause.

 She said it would be a great night for parents to bring along their little ones and relax while they enjoy the playhouse and disco.

“We have had to limit our capacity to 60 and we just want to make sure that everyone can do their bit, there is also a tin so you can donate … it was just like a kid fundraiser for a kid was the big idea,” she said.

“I think we are going to be pretty close to our capacity at this rate but obviously we hope that everyone still gets to come, it’ll be really great to give Eb, Tex and Luke a good path through this.

“The only thing we want is that money is not an issue for them, I know that the community gets behind all these people so well and it’ll be nice if they get behind the Browns in this hard time as well.”

Tex’s mother, Ebony, said it had been an extremely tough time since the accident, but little Tex was recovering well despite awaiting another surgery.

“Tex is his happy self, he does have both his hands in plaster casts so it’s kind of limiting what he can do for himself,” she said.

“He’s had two surgeries so far and we go back Monday coming (for another one) and fingers crossed (it goes well) … the doctors were saying the skin grafts might not take, there is different complications that can occur.

“He might have some limitations with movement as he’s growing, but the care down there (at the RCH) has been phenomenal.”

Ebony said it had been quite a challenging time for the entire family but had been good to have Tex at home in between his surgeries.

“This stretch was four days before we go back (to Melbourne) so it’s been quite nice to come home and be with the girls, and be a family,” she said.

“We’ve been so lucky and thankful for the Ronald McDonald House down in Melbourne, we were able to stay there on our last visit so that helped relieve some of the financial pressure too.

“We are super grateful for the community support and kindness that we’ve been shown throughout this traumatic and terrifying experience, you never plan for these sorts of things to happen and for the people to back us has been amazing … we are deeply grateful.”

If you wish to donate to Tex and the Brown family, you can find the fundraiser here at gofund.me/4dc051fc