Your approach resonates with me. I will recommend Practical Deep Learning For Coders[1]. This course is taught by Jeremy Howard who won kaggle competition for 2 consecutive years. His motto is to "Make Deep Learning Uncool again"

I personally found it very hands on, it jumps into practical application right of the bat which helps keeping the motivation steady. Having said that, its not easy or dumbed down in any sense.

[1] http://course.fast.ai/

Edit: Grammar