DIY: 99¢ Store Christmas Table

I don't know if I have told you this before or not, but I am cheap. Don't get me wrong, I love expensive things. But sometimes, I just can't justify spending a lot of money on things like Christmas decorations. I would really love to, but hey, Dakota and I are college students.
But that's no reason to not have Christmas decorations, right?
So I came up with a plan. But first, a little backstory. Dakota and I got a new entertainment center. Thus, we can repurpose our old (but still new) entertainment center! So it has been placed by our front door as an entry table. And once Dakota moved it there, I had the genius idea to decorate it for Christmas! A place for my Christmas village! (Which I don't have yet.. But I want.) 
But the thing is, the money thing.
So I was like, well I need to go to the 99¢ Store today anyway (they carry picture frames that I am going to use for the gallery wall in the kitchen, I'm finally starting it!) so I checked it out. And was I ever amazed what I found.
Here is what the table looked like before, in all of it's cluttered glory. Hey, I'm going for real life stuff here guys. Don't tell me you don't have clutter.
And if you don't, can you tell me your secrets?

And here's the after:

Very simple, but that's how I like it.  And I even kept with my color palette that I like for Christmas. I probably would've got more, except that the store was packed today and I have issues with crowds and all I wanted to do was get the hell out of dodge.
Whatever that means.
Here are some detail shots:

Okay, so I cheated. The pine cones are off of our tree. But that means free, right?!

Our first Christmas card, from Dakota's grandparents. I adore them.

The "Peace" sign is my favorite thing that I bought today, I can't believe I bought it at the 99¢ store!
Isn't that awesome, though? I only spent a grand total of $11 at the 99¢ store, but some of that was other stuff.
In total I bought,
Table Runner - 99¢ "Peace" Sign - 99¢ Glittery trees - (3) at 99¢ each
So I am pretty proud of myself. Just proof you don't have to spend a lot to decorate for the holidays. I will be adding more to this in the future, but for now, especially with a cat that gets into EVERYTHING this is pretty good.
Oh, and by the way, I wasn't sponsored for this post.  I just love that store.