Another honey bee

It's a mystery to me how this poor bee was managing to function at all, covered in pollen as it was and with its pollen baskets so huge and heavy. But it carried on gamely buzzing the peony flowers to make them release even more - the extra shows it emerging from a different bloom with its head even yellower than in this photo. Both were taken with the 31mm extension tube on the 85mm lens, for this week's Tiny Tuesday challenge. I think it probably qualifies for Technicolour Tuesday as well!

OK - Mono Monday. There were 124 entries this week, with a number of popular interpretations - soft toys being probably the largest slice in the pie chart, followed by soft creatures, soft plant life and soft focus. As ever I found it very difficult to choose my five favourites, but I did promise someone last week that I would endeavour not to make sitting in front of a screen looking at images sound like a day down the salt mine - so suffice it to say that as usual the standard was high. The images I've selected are all ones I wish I had taken, but there are many I liked a lot which I don't have the space to mention, so many thanks to everyone who contributed. I was especially pleased that once again several people said it was their first foray into Mono Monday - I hope they found it fun, and will want to play again another week.

My five hearts go - in no particular order - to:

Miffy for So Soft... There were several nice images of feathers in the challenge, but this stood out for me because of the composition, lighting and focus.

DavidKeith for his recreation of a famous advert - what's not to love about a soft spaniel draped in toilet paper? Great composition and dog control - I just hope Andrex's lawyers don't hear about it.

dbifulco for her crisply focused but very furry bumblebee on a wonderfully soft focus flower. Just lovely.

Natali for Do not let me go... I really like the light in this image, and again the composition and focus are terrific.

TrudieK for her soft focus shot of a cotton boll - I've never touched one, but when I look at this image I believe I know exactly what it would feel like. Great use of the Lensbaby too.

And now, some Honourable Mentions:

Marlieske for a great image of soap suds.

mambo for soft yoke, and perseverance. (And I don't even like boiled eggs!)

Hanulli for Omo's ear - just so strokable.

youoregon1 for The Soft Underbelly, representing all the cats, but getting the nod here for including a hand - it makes me feel as though I'm touching the fur.

For softly waving grasses, I couldn't decide which I liked better between freespiral's A Soft Day, and GEO2B's Soft Grass - so please make up your own mind!

There are two final images I want to highlight: for humorous lateral thinking it would be hard to beat squatbetty's But,soft!; and even though it didn't really say "soft" to me, I still love Tiebreaker's Singing In The Rain.

Please do go and give all these people some more views - and if you have the time, why not follow my tag and take a look at all this week's submissions.

Next week will be my swansong as host of Mono Monday - doesn't time fly! The theme will be Line, and the tag will be mm74.