Looking for some enchantment? You’ve come to the right place. Enchanted Moon Acres, High Street’s latest place to find cool stuff, is tucked one storefront away from Fruition, where bowls and brews of nutritious eats are served up daily. The green bench beside the door invites you to sit down, relax, and let your eyes wander before you step inside. What you see in the architecture of these old storefronts and facades is the legacy of Waynesburg through the years of brick and mortar, boom, bust and renewal. The new sidewalks—just in time for the upcoming holiday shopping season—let you know Greene County is taking care of business and that Waynesburg is the place to shop for what the future has in store.
For Enchanted Moon Acres, any time is great time to meet shopkeepers Erin Pierson and Jennifer Shumaker. The showroom is a great browse, through tables and displays of crystals, hand forged jewelry and oils and tinctures in the boutique side of business. Shop hours are Wednesday through Friday, 11am until 5pm. There are also appointments after hours and on Saturday for the wellness therapies and guided spiritual consultations offered daily in the rooms down the hall.
The main reasons this new shop is open is thepower of family connections—and the healing power of growing up in Greene County.
Jentox, a regime of wellness that features “gentle detoxification and bioenergetics therapies” is a practice Shumaker, a 1987 West Greene grad, started in 2008 while working as an actor in Los Angeles.
“I graduated Penn State with degrees in biology/biochemistry and theater. I worked for the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) in Morgantown as a biochemist before taking off to be an actor.”
Both degrees, she cheerfully admits, were put to good use while working in LA, and Atlanta, Georgia as part of the entertainment industry. Keeping stress at bay and staying healthy brought out the scientist in her approach, first to her own need for wellness, then as a system to help others be their best selves while living the high stakes lives of journeyman actors, professional athletics and high end entrepreneurs.
Shumaker remembers deciding four years ago to come home and help deal with the legal issues involved with the family farm being undermined. She fell in love again with her home turf and its history. Using her handiness with tools, she began restoring a Civil War-era home she purchased from the coal company. “I bought it to flip it for a profit, but now I don’t know. I’m thinking of turning it into a wellness retreat. It’s such a beautiful place! I respect historic old houses. They speak to me.”
For Pierson, the way back home is caught up in the very real stress of early onset illness for women in their 30s that leaves them feeling there’s “nowhere to go to get help.”
Pierson’s childhood spent on her grandparent’s farm in Richhill Township revolved around nature and the unconditional love she shared with her grandparents and their affinity for the land. The little girl who played with baby squirrels and raccoons and collected bird feathers and “wanted to save all the animals” graduated from Central Greene in 2005 and went off to college to become a nurse.
By 2010, Pierson was married and living “the white picket fence, lake front life” near Indianapolis, Indiana, working in emergency rooms and going back to school to study nursing psychology. But beneath the plastic perfection of middle class living, stress and buried trauma were taking their toll. A hysterectomy in 2019, followed by a diagnosis of cancer and the soul-draining pain of chemotherapy, only added to the tumultuousness of divorce and dealing with toxic relationships.
The spiritual awakening Pierson would experience through her early brush with mortality helped her find what lies beyond utter despair. Her pain became a journey of self-rediscovery and empowerment. Unpacking memories of the fears she still carried took her back to the natural life she’d lived wholeheartedly as a child. Along the way, she met others, found her calling at a spiritual retreat, became an ordained minister and accepted the healing power of sharing stories without fear to give empowerment to others. “I began walking my journey by journaling, then connecting with people through Facebook and starting a podcast,” Pierson said, smiling now. “I start each chapter of my podcast like I’m unpacking a box and looking at everything inside. And I invite others to take the journey with me. I’ve learned to be a good advisor, feel empathy, and help others put it in perspective.”
In March, Pierson packed up and headed back to Greene County to live off the grid and rediscover the healing power of nature she’d learned as a wide-eyed child. Every day became a new journey of reconnecting with kids she’d grown up with, finding unexpected connections—some call them serendipity—and mustering up the commitment to create Enchanted Moon Acres.
Serendipity, the fairy godmother of life-changing moments, brought Shumaker into the story this summer. “My mom plays cards with Barbie Sliger;her son George is friends with Erin. She told her about Erin starting a healing center. So we met at Creekside Kitchen in Graysville and hit it right off. It’s a match made in heaven! I’ve been doing treatments at home, and my clinics in LA and Atlanta are operating well, but I’m ready to do this here—it’s one of those moments. In order to heal the body, the spirit and the mind have to heal too.”
Pierson and Shumaker’s passion for their hometown communities lead them to create a healthy, healing environment for Greene County’s residents to enjoy for years. To make an appointment or for additional information, email the team at Enchantedmoonacres@gmail.com.