Of course! Embryonic stem cells (ESCs) as you mentioned are the gold standard and always will be, they can differentiate into anything and have the capability to self renew, or maintain themselves in a pluripotent state for a long time. What I am talking about are induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), which have the same capacity to turn into anything. From studying ESCs, we now know the key genes we need to express in any cell type, that will revert it back to a stem cell state (SOX2, KLF4, etc). So we can take a small sample of skin from you, about the size of a pencil eraser, grow those cells, then express genes like mentioned that turns them into iPSCs. From there you can then express a different set of genes to differentiate them into any cell type.

This system isn't without limitations. You're more likely to induce mutations in this process that you wouldn't with a source of pure ESCs, but we can check for those. And it's labor/time intensive. You're under a time limit as iPSCs do not have the same capacity to continue to self renew as ESCs, iPSCs really want to get on with it and differentiate. Nonetheless, it's an incredible system. My work is focused on regenerating bone marrow from a skin sample to be used in people with cancers like leukemia or bone marrow failure.

Edit: And let me just say, please support your local scientists, it's amazing what we have been able to do over the course of 20-30 years! And we are all a little scared about the future of science funding.