Protected means she choses who views her entries, it's nothing to do with wether you are friends with her or not, she has to add you to her protected list so anyone on that list can see her blog entries. Also if you tried that and it doesn't work, are you sure it's set to protected?
Maybe she set the entries so they can only be viewed by her? There are several options. One is open to all, the other is the personal one where only she gets to see it and she can chose that only xanga users are allowed to see her blog and the protected is where she choses specific people.

and this is where she adds people to her protected list
http://www.xanga.com/Private/protectedposting.aspx

EDIT: or he... I didn't know...Just an assumption...