Hi, my name is Pete McKenzie and I am fundraising for the Elliott family.

Annabella Rose Elliott was feisty, creative, and loved to dance. She’d just started high school and was growing into a beautiful young woman, full of energy and ready to grab life by the horns.

In a tragic moment on a Friday morning in March 2026, Annabella was struck by a car as she crossed a busy road to get to her school bus. Despite the best efforts of paramedics and medical staff, she never regained consciousness - and died at the Royal Children’s hospital ten days later from her injuries. Her heartbroken parents, Niki and Paul, chose to allow her precious organs to be donated, providing life-saving assistance to several other children and young people.

The Ballarat community has been left devastated by the loss of this wonderful, colourful soul. But her loving family, especially her parents Niki and Paul, and younger sister Eliza-Jane, are completely broken, with a pain that cannot be expressed in words. They can’t imagine life without Annabella and are still struggling to process that their darling girl is never coming home.

Grief like this is life-changing and requires considerable time and support.

This fundraiser has been created to help give the Elliott family breathing space — to ease the pressure of bills, funeral costs, living expenses and lost income while they begin the long and painful journey of grieving Annabella. Please help our community support Niki and Paul to be able to take the time they need to process the loss of their beautiful daughter.

As a community, we also want to support the family to travel together to Annabella’s birthplace in Scotland, where her father Paul is from and where she has an older sister and extended family. The family want to return at this excruciating time, to grieve together, to be held by the people who love them, and to find even a small measure of comfort surrounded by family.

Nothing can fix the heartbreak this family is carrying. But together, we can help remove some of the financial pressure so that Niki, Paul, and Eliza Jane have the time, space, and support they desperately need.