Tiger stripes

There are several techniques I've noticed that trend through other soaper's projects.  One that is very catchy is the tiger stripe where alternating layers of coloured soap are poured; so after a couple of youtube tutorials I tried my hand at it.

I'm pretty happy with how this one came out.  There's definitely a fine balance of how thick the batter needs to be (medium) and how fast you need to pour so that the batter is still at medium trace when you get to the top layers.  There's no real theme to the soap balls on top... I just had extra balls that I wanted to do something with.  The red top was an unexpected colour - I was going for more of a red hued purple (Note: don't need much of the red mica at all).

Most videos I saw poured in a "back and forth" layer - so from one side of the mold to the other and then back again.  The very thin lines in the middle was the result of going from only one side to the other (while the white was a back and forth).

In the second attempt, I totally forgot about the back and forth as seen by the thin lines.  The white soap was getting pretty thick by the end too.  In other news I think the oil mica top is great for people like me who don't have patience or the foresight to leave extra soap for a textured top.  Plus it's a quick and easy last minute decorating technique.

I like the look of the thick stripes much better.  Once I finish with the Holly swirl (swirl in a swirl) challenge, the plan is to make a tiger stripe soap that is actually tiger themed but scented like chocolate because I really want to use that fragrance oil.