Your idea will work fine. I once made a T-shirt quilt for a neice, and printed out several pictures on printable fabric blocks purchased just for that reason. Before I gave it to her I washed it, following the directions to the "T", but ALL of the pictures faded out - they looked like ghost pictures. I reprinted them, cut them a little larger than the original pictures and sewed them on, using decorative stitches and/or rick-rack. Worked just fine!! Good luck.