Got to be birds flying higher

I'm teaching myself a new (to me) piece of software called Clip Studio Paint. For years I have seen people rave about this very affordable program and I'm joining that crowd. It's so easy to get up and running and make a decent looking picture. Here's my first real picture that I did in an afternoon. It's by no means a masterpiece, but it was enough to get up to speed on all the basic features and get a little confidence.

I feel like I'm old enough that I should know how to paint digitally, but it never ends up looking right to me.

Please tell me that I'm not the only person who ever had their bird commissioned at a fan/comic/anime convention :-D The artist is Sweet Star Designs.