Charity house named for special girl

CHESAPEAKE, Va. - At just nine-months-old, Sydney Lambert was diagnosed with an almost unheard-of-case of ovarian cancer. Doctors removed a tumor the size of a softball from the infant and six years later, the little girl is alive and well. So well in fact, a home is being dedicated in her honor.

Sydney Lambert is going into the first grade at Grassfield Elementary in Chesapeake. She's just like all of the rest of the kids, except for one thing that happened to her when she was just a baby. 

It's that one thing that inspired the "Sydney Lambert House."

"She knows she was really sick and had big 'boo-boos' and that's about it," said her Mom Kim.

Sydney was too young to remember, just nine-months-old when it happened. "She was a happy little kid and fine, and one day we looked at her and her stomach looked like she was nine months pregnant. So I took her down to the ER," Kim told WAVY.com.

Doctors found a mass the size of a softball in Sydney's tiny tummy. They thought they knew what it was but Kim said they couldn't be sure because no one had ever seen this in a child before - Sydney was diagnosed with ovarian cancer.

A baby with ovarian cancer. The diagnosis is so rare her doctors had to research a protocol. Sydney ended up getting surgery and six months of high dose harsh chemothreapy.

Five years later, the only sign she even had cancer is the one on Dodd Steet in Chesapeake. Tidewater Builders Association (TBA) named its 2009 Homearama charity house in her honor.

TBA has built 20 charity houses over the years, and has raised more than one-million dollars for local children's programs.

The profits from the Sydney Lambert home will go to Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters in Norfolk, where Sydney was treated.

There will be a house dedication ceremony Tuesday morning. Sydney will be there to help plant a tree out front.

Homearama will take place in October in the Culpepper Landing subdivision, near the Dismal Swamp in Chesapeake.

Related Links:

Tidewater Builders Association: tbaonline.org/

Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters: chkd.org/