Good onya! with the new bike. I think you got the right bike as it does lean more to the road bike side and i'm sure you'll appreciate it more over time.
With the barends you could wrap them in roadbike bar tape if you like and I would also angle them up a little, try playing about with different positions with things before spending more money. I don't know about specific dropbar convertions people have done to a Sirrus but there's plenty of drop convertions people have done looking back through threads on here.