Spittoon, what you have described seems totally reasonable and safe. What happens in my neck of the woods is I request the practice approach, what I hear from the controller is something like
'Cleared for the ILS 30 practice approach, maintain VFR, VFR separation services not provided' (or similar) .
Then I fly the approach as normal, but I am not cleared to fly the missed
Speaking with controllers in a less formal setting, I am told that although the controller will not provide legal IFR separation to me, they always try to. The main difference to the controller, from what I hear, is that in a practice approach they do not have to deconflict the missed approach procedure. As there may be IFR arrivals in that airspace that makes it a lot easier for them to keep the flow rate up.