With the requisite hand gestures, of course.
I’ve seen this only a few times in my life. Is this a regional or generational thing? I saw on one online site that it was attested only since the 1950s.
Yes, I hear it used in my neck of the woods.
I use it. Not often, but I do use it.
I hear it used, usually by older guys at work (I’m 36). Can’t recall ever using it myself, but I certainly recognize it and it’s not uncommon.
I heard it more often from my Nana, who’s from eastern PA.
I’ve always used “yay big” in describing things and have heard it all my life. I’ve never had any problem with it being understood or had anybody question it so I always assumed it was common everywhere.
Yes, from the Buffalo, NY area.
George Carlin actually defined a ‘yay’, I think in When Will Jesus Bring The Porkchops?, as “the distance between two hands” on a list of measurements that should exist.
I don’t even know what it is meant to imply.
You generally need to use your hands while saying it to describe, say, the size of a rat. I have heard it in my life and I was raised Southern.
Ah. OK, now I get it. Yes, I have heard it. More in rural PA than anywhere else. (The *yea *in the OP’s title was seen by me as the slang word for yes )
Philly guy here. “Yay big,” the distance between the speaker’s hands, is a commonly used expression where I grew up (Northwest Philly).
I’ve heard it but I think ‘so big’ is more common here in the midwest.
Heard it a lot from my mom’s (Southern) family while growing up but not from anyone else around here that I can recall.
I’ve never heard it here. What I hear is: “It’s, like, about this big.”
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen it in writing before but you mean holding your hands a few inches apart and saying “it’s about yay big,” right? If so, I’ve heard it on occasion. Yay is one of those words that never looks right written down, though.
I’ve heard yea big, so big, and yea so.
“About yay big” or “yay high” is common in Australia, usually used by older people.
I quite like it.
Yep, still said by some of us oldies in these parts.
I’ve heard it and used it my whole life here in the Northeastern Ohio region.
Yeah same as kittenblue.