Sounds good dude, I am going to look at mine now. I know what you mean and I can't remember If mine are like that or not. I put springs on mine by my self before I got it aligned, and took pictures of the before and after alignment just to see if anything was changed. I will find those pictures plus look at mine in the garage to see if mine is the same as yours.

 

Both of these are possible .... but to check the shocks
push down heavy on the front fender to see how the strut reacts
this is not a difinitive test but just to make sure things are okay(if things start bouncing or it is looser than stock then you have problems) Stock shocks should be okay with lowering the car but you may see the car bottom out a bit more .... the rates are adjusted for the length of the spring

Most likely it is an alignment issue and this may be due to lowering the car .... when the car is lowered it puts extra stress on the tie rods and if they are not put into proper alignment they can either pop out ( seen this happen mostly on drops more than 2.5") or they can wear and become loose.

If this happens under breaking, bumps, acceleration(less noticable) then this is most likely the reason ..... ball joints can do this as well
if this happens during cruising .... most likely alignment

A good alignment guy can check all of these with a test drive and 5 minutes on a hoist.