I hear and use “'bout yay big” “'bout so big” and “'bout that big” pretty equally. Chicago.
It’s still in use around here.
Heard it all my life (43 years), as a kid in Arkansas and an adult in Atlanta.
It’s in Wisconsin, but I can’t account for anybody under 30 using it. I never used the term. I always said “It’s this big.” and use the hand gesture.
Common back home in New Brunswick (Canada), and while I still use it often here, I can’t say that I’ve heard anyone actually use it. However, no one has ever raised any question as to the meaning when I have used it, and it seems, in context, to be readily understood by most. Even my Czech manager hasn’t raised a question when I use it with her, though I do see a note of puzzlement in her eyes, she still gets it, and hasn’t asked me yet what it means - she just pauses. She usually writes that stuff down if she doesn’t get it. This leads me to believe she’s heard it from someone other than me, though probably not often.
It’s common back home (and for myself) to shorten it when describing something quickly, using your hands and saying, “'bout yay”, without the “big” attached, and it still gets the point across. “About yay big” or “yay tall” is still very commonly used, however.
This is coming from someone who thought “had the biscuit” was universally known, though. 
I’ve heard it frequently around here, always with “about.” It’s always about dimensions that your hands can illustrate. It’s never “about yay stupid.”
Be sure to look at both of the speaker’s hands, though. I’ve seen fishermen use the yay big gesture to show the size of a fish, but one hand was making a thumb-to-finger yay big to show a much smaller fish. 
Yay high is usually a one-handed gesture.
It’s used here, but I can’t figure out if I use it or not. It’s the sort of thing I would tend to use. Yea big/high/tall.
I should have defined “here.” SE Ohio. Husband from Kentucky heard it while growing up, too.
I googled around a bit and found it spelled “yea” (I was unsure). For example, this bit is from an article called “using indexicals” by a John Perry:
I never heard of an “indexical” before.
To answer the OP, I’ve heard it off an on all my life (southern usa).