I love your work, but this feels… not to sound rude, but this one is out of place. Granted it is very good… basically it is different from your other work like Princess Mononoke is different from My Neighbors the Yamandas (both Studio Ghibli).
I have no idea what Yamandas is...but I get what you're saying. I don't normally do simple, blue skies, or happy. But, it's good to do different things. You can't just do the same things over and over again.
Indeed… it's funny how you mentioned the background as perhaps that is what is throwing me off. You're right about doing something different every once and a while.
I also drew in a brush size 4 which I never do lol
I usually do a 2 or a 3...but some reason, this style was calling to me.