I like, Ms Nightfire.
I like griffins as well; I used to make up stories in my head about them when I was about 6-7ish. I saw a picture of one by Bert Kitchen (an absolutely brilliant illustrator) and thought to myself, now there's a cool creature!
Technically, if it's got lion's front paws, it's an opinicus, not a griffin, but that's just me being picky. As you said, it's your own style and that sort of thing doesn't really matter outside of heraldry anyway.