with geometric blocks you can basically figure out the needs for it and then figure from there the number of blocks needed, plus any borders and binding. With applique you can figure the needed yardage for background and guesstimate for the applique. I am clueless about paper piecing figuring yardage and find I'm bit more "wasteful" when paper piecing. if you can get your hands on an EQ8 computer program you could draw the blocks and figure--suppose you could do that on graph paper with ruler, etc. Laborious!