When creating a packet how does the network layer determine the size of the packet?

The Network layer (Layer 3, typically IP) will receive a segment from the Transport layer (Layer 4, typically TCP or UDP), and will add its own header to it to create a packet. The size of the packet will thus always be the size of the segment plus the Network layer header, the same as when the next layer down (the Data Link layer, layer 2, typically Ethernet) encapsulates the packet into a frame for transmission.